Reactivation of Chandrayaan-3 Lander and Rover postponed by one day: ISRO official

Bengaluru: The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) has postponed the reactivation of Chandrayaan-3’s Pragyan rover and Vikram lander, initially planned for Friday evening, to Saturday. The decision was attributed to various reasons, as stated by Director of Space Applications Centre, Nilesh Desai.

Desai confirmed the rescheduling in a statement to news agency ANI, saying, “Earlier we planned to reactivate the rover and lander on the evening of 22nd September, but due to some reasons, we will now do it tomorrow on 23rd September. We have a plan to take out the lander and rover from the sleep mode and reactivate it.”

The reactivation initiative is intended to bring the rover and lander out of their ‘sleep mode’, which was initiated approximately 16 Earth days ago, just before the onset of the lunar night at the Moon’s south pole.

Desai elaborated on the original plan to reactivate the rover, aiming to navigate it further across the Moon’s surface. He stated, “We had a plan to move the rover to almost 300-350 meters. But due to some reasons we couldn’t. The rover has moved 105 meters till now. Last time, we moved it for 10 days on the surface of the moon.”

Both components of Chandrayaan-3 operated efficiently for around 10 Earth days and accomplished their designated tasks. The rover entered ‘sleep mode’ on September 2, followed by the lander on September 4.

Desai also highlighted the significant data acquired by the rover, emphasizing that the data has been archived and ISRO’s scientists are actively analyzing it.

Also Read: ISRO Aims To Revive Pragyan Rover And Vikram Lander On The Moon After Lunar Dawn

The Chandrayaan-3 mission garnered success with Vikram lander achieving a ‘soft-landing’ on the Moon on August 24, establishing India as the first nation to land on the Moon’s south pole. The Pragyaan rover subsequently conducted in-situ experiments, successfully detecting various elements despite the extreme lunar conditions, including Sulphur (S), Aluminium, Calcium, Ferrous (Iron), Chromium, Titanium, Manganese, Silicon, and Oxygen. However, the challenging nighttime temperatures at the Moon’s south pole, plummeting to as low as -200°C, pose a significant hurdle for operations and experimentation.

#WATCH | Anand, Gujarat: On Chandrayaan-3, Director of Space Applications Centre, Nilesh Desai says, “…Earlier we planned to reactivate the (Pragyan) rover and (Vikram) lander on the evening of 22nd September, but due to some reasons we will now do it tomorrow on 23rd… pic.twitter.com/bvFTkXpNjZ

— ANI (@ANI) September 22, 2023