Tennease
Legend
SPACE 6 September 2019
By Leah Crane
Artist’s rendition of the Vikram lander deploying the Pragyan rover
ISRO/YouTube
Once again, an attempted moon landing has not gone according to plan. On 6 September, India’s Vikram lander lost contact with Earth during an attempt to land on the moon and appears to have crashed, just five months after Israel’s Beresheet spacecraft faced a similar fate. If the landing had been successful, it would have made India the fourth nation ever to land on the moon after the Soviet Union, the US, and China.
Vikram was part of the Chandrayaan 2 mission, which launched from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre in India on 22 July. The mission also includes an orbiter and a six-wheeled rover called Pragyan, which was carried inside the lander.
Most of the landing sequence went as planned, but as the lander neared the surface, just 2.1 kilometres above the ground, it started to diverge from the plan. Shortly afterward it lost communication with Earth and may not have been able to slow itself down enough to land safely. The Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) is analysing the data they have now to determine exactly what happened.
The spacecraft was intended to touch down near the south pole of the moon, where no lander or rover has ever been before. This unexplored region is particularly interesting because its craters contain areas that are permanently in shadow, where water ice can remain without being blasted away by sunlight.
Water ice is important for human space flight because it can be used to make rocket fuel and support astronauts, which is why NASA’s plans to land humans on the moon in 2024 involve landing in the area.
Chandrayaan 2’s orbiter remains in orbit around the moon, where it was intended to relay data from the lander and rover back to Earth as well as taking data of its own. The orbiter itself is carrying eight scientific instruments, which will still be used to map the moon’s surface and study its atmosphere.
https://www.newscientist.com/articl...n-lander-appears-to-have-crashed-on-the-moon/
By Leah Crane
Artist’s rendition of the Vikram lander deploying the Pragyan rover
ISRO/YouTube
Once again, an attempted moon landing has not gone according to plan. On 6 September, India’s Vikram lander lost contact with Earth during an attempt to land on the moon and appears to have crashed, just five months after Israel’s Beresheet spacecraft faced a similar fate. If the landing had been successful, it would have made India the fourth nation ever to land on the moon after the Soviet Union, the US, and China.
Vikram was part of the Chandrayaan 2 mission, which launched from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre in India on 22 July. The mission also includes an orbiter and a six-wheeled rover called Pragyan, which was carried inside the lander.
Most of the landing sequence went as planned, but as the lander neared the surface, just 2.1 kilometres above the ground, it started to diverge from the plan. Shortly afterward it lost communication with Earth and may not have been able to slow itself down enough to land safely. The Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) is analysing the data they have now to determine exactly what happened.
The spacecraft was intended to touch down near the south pole of the moon, where no lander or rover has ever been before. This unexplored region is particularly interesting because its craters contain areas that are permanently in shadow, where water ice can remain without being blasted away by sunlight.
Water ice is important for human space flight because it can be used to make rocket fuel and support astronauts, which is why NASA’s plans to land humans on the moon in 2024 involve landing in the area.
Chandrayaan 2’s orbiter remains in orbit around the moon, where it was intended to relay data from the lander and rover back to Earth as well as taking data of its own. The orbiter itself is carrying eight scientific instruments, which will still be used to map the moon’s surface and study its atmosphere.
https://www.newscientist.com/articl...n-lander-appears-to-have-crashed-on-the-moon/
