An Indian spacecraft landed on the Moon to join an elite spacefaring club comprising China, Russia and the United States – the only nations to have ever achieved the feat. India, however, becomes the first to land in the lunar south pole region.
“India is on the Moon,” announced Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) Chairman S Somanath after Chandrayaan-3 touched down on the moon’s rugged south pole where the 26-kilo robotic buggy will explore for water.
The spacecraft hovered for around 20 seconds over a pre-designated landing site as ISRO scientists oversaw its controlled descent some 65 metres in the final minute at 8:34am Eastern Time.
‘Gift for humanity’
“It was a flawless landing,” said Mission Director P Veeramuthuvel as scientists cheered and clapped at an ISRO control centre.
“We have become the fourth country to land on the Moon and the first to reach its south pole,” Veeramuthuvel said as his colleagues unveiled ISRO’s planned projects such as a crewed lunar flight, an expedition to Venus and a solar observatory in space.
Meanwhile Prime Minister Narendra Modi said India was proving the "sky is not the limit” after tuning into a live ISRO webcast from Johannesburg, where he is attending a Brics summit.
“All the people of the world, the people of every country and region: India’s successful Moon mission is not just India’s alone ... this success belongs to all of humanity. We can all aspire for the moon, and beyond.
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Modi also alluded to India’s 44-million-euro maiden Moon rocket, which lost contact with Earth nine months after electronics on board Chandrayaan-1 failed in 2009.
”Today is also a testimony of how to move on from failure to success,” he said.
Almost a decade later, misfortune hit India again after Chandrayaan-2 carrying a lander, orbiter and a buggy went into lunar orbit on 20 August 2019 but crashed days after while attempting to touch down on the moon's rocky surface.
Russia's first moon mission in 47 years failed last week when Luna-25 spacecraft crashed into the moon after a catastrophic glitch.
The failure underscored the decline of Russia's space power since the glory days of Cold War competition when Moscow was the first to launch a satellite to orbit the Earth – Sputnik 1, in 1957 – and Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin became the first man to travel into space in 1961.
Chandrayaan-2 was originally a joint project with Russia and slated to fly out in 2011 or 2012 but Moscow pulled out of the collaboration to delay the project by years.
Away from the Chandrayaan series, India in a joint effort with Japan kicked off what is known as the Lunar Polar Exploration Mission (LUPEX).
The collaboration plans to launch a rocket in 2025 to assess the possibility of establishing a lunar base, search for water and conduct surface exploration, said a ISRO official.
Saku Tsuneta, a top Japanese space policy-planner, visited India this month to review the LUPEX mission. "The two sides discussed the development of a smaller lander for the joint flight,” he told RFI.
India on its own has conducted 77 successful rocket launches and also put into orbit 424 commercial satellites from 34 countries and is now eyeing a larger slice of that global multi-billion-euro market.
India became the only country in the world to reach Mars on its first attempt in 2014.
