'Prolonged spell of cold weather conditions': Union minister on ISRO not getting signals from Chandrayaan-3's lander and rover

Science and Technology Minister Jitendra Singh said "prolonged spell of cold weather conditions" could be the reason for ISRO not being able to ascertain the "wake-up condition" of Chandrayaan-3's lander and rover. 

Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) on Friday said it has made efforts to establish communication with its lunar mission Chandrayaan-3's lander Vikram and rover Pragyan to ascertain their 'wake-up condition' after they had been put into sleep mode early this month -- but no signals have been received from them as of now.

Attempts to make contact with the lander and rover will continue, the national space agency said on social media platform X (formerly Twitter).

This could be possibly because of prolonged spell of cold weather conditions upto -150 degree C during the just concluded lunar night of 14 Earth days, said Singh on X.

"For the last several hours,Team #ISRO making best effort to establish contact with the Vikram lander and Pragyan rover to ascertain their wake-up condition after the sunrise on Moon. As of now, no signal has been received from them so far. This could be possibly because of prolonged spell of cold weather conditions upto -150 degree C during the just concluded lunar night of 14 Earth days. However, efforts to establish contact shall continue," posted Singh on X. 

With dawn breaking on the Moon, ISRO attempted to reestablish communication with the lander and rover, to revive them so that they can continue with scientific experiments.

Both the lander and the rover were put into sleep mode earlier this month on September 4 and 2 respectively, ahead of the lunar night setting in on Earth's only natural satellite. However, their receivers were kept on. ''Efforts have been made to establish communication with the Vikram lander and Pragyan rover to ascertain their wake-up condition. As of now, no signals have been received from them. Efforts to establish contact will continue.'' ISRO said in a post on 'X'.

"We have put both the lander and rover on sleep mode because temperature would go as low as minus 120-200 degree celsius. From September 20 onwards, sunrise will be going on at the Moon and by September 22 we hope that the solar panel and other things will be fully charged, so we will be trying to revive both the lander and rover, " ISRO's Space Applications Centre Director Nilesh Desai had told PTI on Thursday.

With sunlight back on the south polar region of the Moon, where both lander and rover are located, and their solar panels believed to be optimally charged, ISRO is making efforts to establish contact with them again to check their health and ability to resume functioning, in order to try to revive them.

After landing on the Moon on August 23, both the lander and the rover, and payloads onboard had performed experiments one after the other so as to complete them within 14 Earth days (one lunar day), before pitch darkness and extreme cold weather engulfed the Moon.

The lander and rover — with a total mass of 1,752 kg — were designed to operate for one lunar daylight period (about 14 Earth days) to study the surroundings there. However ISRO is hoping they can be revived, now that the Sun has risen again on the Moon, and that they carry on with the experiments and studies there.

With inputs from PTI