BENGALURU, Aug 21 (Reuters) – India’s space agency on Monday released images its spacecraft took of the far side of the moon as it headed for an attempted landing on the lunar south pole, just days after the failure of a Russian lander.
The Indian Space Research Organisation’s (ISRO) Chandrayaan-3 spacecraft had been in a race with Russia to be the first to land on the lunar south pole, a region whose shadowed craters are thought to contain water ice that could support a future moon settlement.
As news of the failure of Russia’s Luna-25 mission broke on Sunday, ISRO said that Chandrayaan-3 was on course to land on Aug. 23.
All systems on the spacecraft are working “perfectly” and no contingencies are anticipated on the landing day, the space agency said on Monday.
The mission – Chandrayaan means “moon vehicle” in Hindi and Sanskrit – is India’s second attempt to land on the south pole of the moon. In 2019, ISRO’s Chandrayaan-2 mission successfully deployed an orbiter but its lander crashed.
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Source: https://www.reuters.com/world/india/moon-landing-anticipation-builds-india-after-russias-crash-2023-08-21/
