India’s space agency ISRO today made efforts to re-establish communication with the rover Pragyan and lander Vikram, landed near the south polar region of the Moon, to ascertain their wake-up condition. The rover and lander were put into sleep mode. They were “safely parked” on September 2 after Lunar Night. One day on the Moon is equal to 14 days on Earth.
ISRO said in its update on Chandrayaan-3 mission, “No signal has been received from them. Efforts to establish contact will continue.”
The space agency planned to reestablish communications today. The rover and lander were put into sleep mode on September 2 and 4 respectively.
According to the mission instructions, as the morning dawns and sunlight returns to the moon’s south-polar region, the solar panels of the lander and rover are expected to be charged to maximum capacity soon. ISRO will try to revive them and check their health and functionality.
ISRO’s Space Applications Center director Nilesh Desai had earlier told PTI that “We have put the lander and rover on sleep mode because the temperature will go down to minus 120-200 degrees Celsius. Sunrise will be happening on the Moon from September 20 and we hope that by September 22, the solar panels and other things will be fully charged, so we will try to revive both the lander and the rover.”
Prime Minister Narendra Modi had earlier announced that the landing spot of lander Vikram would be called ‘Shiv Shakti Point’. The Prime Minister made this announcement while meeting ISRO scientists in Bengaluru to congratulate them on the success of the mission.
Apart from this, the point on the Moon, where Chandrayaan-2 crashed in 2019, has been named ‘Tiranga Point’.
Lander Vikram touched down again on the lunar surface after restarting its engines before being put into sleep mode. Then he rose about 40 centimeters and jumped about 30-40 centimeters.
Vikram Lander has exceeded the objectives of Chandrayaan-3 mission and successfully completed the one hop experiment. On command he started the engine, as expected raised himself about 40 cm and landed safely at a distance of 30 – 40 cm.
