BENGALURU – India’s Chandrayaan-3 lunar exploration mission’s lander “Vikram” carrying the rover named “Pragyan” successfully landed on the moon’s south pole at 8.35pm (local time).
Prime Minister Narendra Modi witnessed the historic landing from South Africa’s Johannesburg.
According to reports, a successful “soft” – or controlled – landing would enable the rover to roll off a ramp on the lander.
No country has made such a landing before and India’s own attempt to do so in that lunar region via the Chandrayaan-2 project failed four years ago.
“Chandrayaan” means “moon craft” in the Hindi language.
India is now the first country to land a probe in the polar region of the moon and the fourth to land anywhere on the lunar surface.
According to reports in the Times of India, in a few hours, Vikram’s cargo, Pragyan, is expected to be deployed on the lunar surface.
Bernama earlier reported that Russia launched a lunar mission this month, the country’s first since 1976, but its Luna-25 lander crashed into the moon’s surface on August 19.
Roscosmos, the Russian state space agency, said the 800-kg craft had “moved into an unpredictable orbit and ceased to exist” as a result of the collision.
In 2019, China’s Chang’e-4 spacecraft was the first probe by any country to successfully land on the far side of the moon – the side that always faces away from earth.
China’s first lunar landing was in 2013, on the more familiar near side, making it only the third country to have achieved such success after the former Soviet Union and the US.
The privately-funded Israeli Beresheet spacecraft, carrying devices to measure the moon’s magnetism, crashed while trying to land in April 2019.
“India’s successful moon mission is not just India’s alone... this success belongs to all of humanity,” said Modi, who is in Johannesburg for the 15th BRICS summit. – The Vibes, August 23, 2023
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