The Indian Space Research Organisation revealed late last week that its Chandrayaan-2 moon orbiter has twice maneuvered to avoid potential collisions with similar craft.
The Indian craft raised its orbit on September 19 – two weeks before it would have made an uncomfortably close encounter with Korea's Danuri spacecraft, according to the Indian space agency’s monthly summary report [PDF].
While the collision-avoidance maneuver successfully allowed the space agencies to escape a very expensive fender-bender, a second maneuver was necessary – and was made on October 1 – to avoid collision with NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO).
The LRO’s orbit is highly elliptical around the Moon, with an average altitude of about 50km, as it circulates to survey the entire lunar surface and search for water, ice and other resources.
Chandrayaan also operates at 100km, from where it maps the lunar surface and conducts thermal imaging. Again, the goal is gathering data on water and ice.