ISRO Chief S. Somanath Reveals India's Venus Mission Plans After Mars-Moon Success

On Tuesday, ISRO Chairman S Somanath announced that the mission to Venus has been fully configured, and its payload has been successfully developed.

While addressing the Indian National Science Academy in Delhi, ISRO chairman said," We have a lot of missions in the conceptual phase. A mission to Venus is already configured. Payloads have already developed for it."

The ISRO chief highlighted that venturing to the solar system's most radiant planet will provide valuable insights into the realm of space science by addressing specific inquiries.

"Venus is a very interesting planet. It also has an atmosphere. Its atmosphere is so thick. The atmospheric pressure is 100 times that of Earth and it is full of acids. You cannot penetrate the surface. You don't know if its surface is hard or not. Why are we trying to understand all of this? Earth could be one day Venus. I don't know. Maybe 10,000 years later we (Earth) change our characteristics. Earth was never like this. It was not a habitable place long long back," ANI quoted ISRO chief as saying.

Within the solar system, Venus holds the distinction of being the second-closest planet to the Sun. It belongs to the innermost group of terrestrial or rocky planets, often earning the moniker "Earth's twin" due to its remarkable resemblance in terms of size and density.

Among the more recent missions to Venus, notable examples include ESA's Venus Express, which conducted its orbital mission from 2006 to 2016, and Japan's Akatsuki Venus Climate Orbiter, which has been successfully orbiting Venus since 2016.

NASA's Parker Solar Probe has undertaken several flybys of Venus. In a significant development, on February 9 of the previous year, NASA revealed that the spacecraft had successfully captured its inaugural visible light images of Venus' surface from space during its flyby in February 2021.