Chandrayaan-3 landing update: ISRO says mission on schedule 30 hours before touchdown

Chandrayaan-3 landing updates: Ahead of Chandrayaan-3's soft landing on lunar south pole on August 23, the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) on Tuesday said that the mission is on schedule, and that the systems are undergoing regular checks.

The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) has confirmed that the historic touchdown on the Moon’s southern extremity is scheduled for 6.04 pm on August 23.

Giving an update, ISRO also shared the images of the moon captured by the Lander Position Detection Camera (LPDC) from an altitude of about 70 km, on August 19, 2023.

“The mission is on schedule. Systems are undergoing regular checks. Smooth sailing is continuing. The Mission Operations Complex (MOX) is buzzed with energy & excitement! The live telecast of the landing operations at MOX/ISTRAC begins at 17:20 Hrs. IST on August 23, 2023. Here are the images of the moon captured by the Lander Position Detection Camera (LPDC) from an altitude of about 70 km, on August 19, 2023. LPDC images assist the Lander Module in determining its position (latitude and longitude) by matching them against an onboard moon reference map,” ISRO said on Tuesday.

 

 

On Monday, Chandrayaan-3's Lander Module established two-way communication with the already present Chandrayaan-2's orbiter, which was launched in 2019 for the purpose of achieving a ‘soft landing’ on the Moon's south pole. 

The final deboosting of the Chandrayaan-3 lander was completed on Sunday to reduce its orbit to 25X134 km around the Moon.

Earlier in the day, ISRO chief S. Somanath said that the team is confident that all is well so far and there have been no contingencies faced until this juncture. 

“We are confident as everything has been all fine so far and there have been no contingencies faced until this juncture. We’ve done all the preparations and all systems have performed as we needed them to until this stage. Now, we are preparing for the landing with multiple simulations, verification and double verification of systems, checking of instruments’ health is being done on Monday and today,” he said.

On Monday, Nilesh M Desai, Director, Space Applications Centre-ISRO, Ahmedabad, said that the Chandrayaan-3's landing on Moon may get postponed to August 27 if the space agency finds the position of the lander is not suitable for the descent. 

He said the space agency will take a decision on whether or not it will be appropriate to land Chandrayaan-3 two hours before the landing is actually scheduled. 

"If we feel that the position of the lander is not suitable for landing, then we will extend it to August 27. We will try to land the lander on August 23," Desai explained on Monday.

 

Why landing on lunar south pole tricky

The lunar south pole is the side that faces away from the Earth and is sometimes also called "the dark side of the Moon". The south pole is known to have rugged terrain and has been in the shade of perpetual darkness for billions of years with plummeting temperatures. Researchers have previously reported the presence of water ice on this side. 

Attempted landings on the moon have failed before. The recent one was Russia's Luna-25 craft, which was scheduled to land on the south pole on Monday but spun out of control on approach and crashed on Sunday. 

Roskosmos said in a statement that it lost touch with the craft on Saturday at 11:57 GMT due to a glitch as the craft was shoved into pre-landing orbit.

Roscosmos Director General Yury Borisov on Monday said that the Luna-25 spacecraft crashed into the moon after its engines failed to shut down correctly. He said the spacecraft's engines were turned on over the weekend to put Luna-25 into a “pre-landing orbit" but did not shut down properly, plunging the lander onto the moon.

Also read: Chandrayaan-3’s ‘failure-based design’ is key to its Moon landing; here’s what it is

Also read: Chandrayaan-3 touchdown: What are Vikram Lander and rover expected to do after soft landing on Aug 23

 

Chandrayaan-3's challenges and chances

Following Luna-25 crash, one question that has been bothering many is whether the landing of Chandrayaan-3 will be a success. 

Scientists and experts have said that the final few kilometers could be very crucial for Chandrayaan-3. Professor Annapurni Subramaniam, senior astronomer and director of Indian Institute of Astrophysics (IIA), Bengaluru, told News 18 that the last 30 km that will be quite crucial.

"The parameters of space are vast and involve complexities. There will always be a small non-zero probability that it can go wrong and we cannot eliminate that. But I’m quite certain that we will make it this time," said Subramaniam. 

"This is a very challenging mission of ISRO. It contained so many stages — firstly, Chandrayaan-3 was put into the Earth's orbit, then it was sent to Moon transfer trajectory, then it reached the Moon's orbit, and now the lander and rover have reached the pre-landing orbit. All these stages have been completed accurately," said R C Kapoor, a former professor at the Indian Institute of Astrophysics.

"The Lander and the Rover are presently revolving in the pre-landing orbit of the Moon. These (Lander and Rover) have been prepared by examining the situation of the previous time. The algorithm has been made bug-free," Kapoor added.

Also watch: Why Russia's moon mission Luna-25 failed and will India's Chandrayaan-3 succeed? 

Also watch: Major catastrophic failures before Luna-25 in space: Chandrayaan-2, Apollo 13, and more