India launched its maiden expedition to the Sun just days after landing a spacecraft on the Moon to mark the South Asian power’s rapid ascend as a space-faring nation.
A 44-metre rocket carrying the 1.4-ton observatory blasted off at 11:50 am local time on Saturday. It will cover a distance of 932,000 in 125 days before deploying the probe in a halo orbit of the Sun to study the star’s corona and solar winds for five years.
