India on Wednesday landed a spacecraft near the moon's south pole, an uncharted territory that scientists believe could hold vital reserves of frozen water and precious elements. A lander with a rover inside touched down on the lunar surface at 6:04pm local time, sparking cheers and applause among the space scientists watching in the southern Indian city of Bengaluru. It was a historic moment on two fronts: With the landing, India becomes the first country to touch down near the little-explored south pole region and the fourth to achieve a moon landing, joining the US, the former Soviet Union, and China, reports the AP.
India's Chandrayaan-3—"moon craft" in Sanskrit—took off from a launchpad in Sriharikota in southern India on July 14. The six-wheeled lander and rover module of Chandrayaan-3 is configured with payloads that will provide data to the scientific community on the properties of lunar soil and rocks, including chemical and elemental compositions.
India's previous attempt to land a robotic spacecraft near the moon's little-explored south pole ended in failure in 2019. It entered the lunar orbit but lost touch with its lander, which crashed while making its final descent to deploy a rover to search for signs of water. According to a failure analysis report submitted to the Indian Space Research Organization, the crash was caused by a software glitch.
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With nuclear-armed India emerging as the world's fifth-largest economy last year, Prime Minister Narendra Modi's nationalist government is eager to showcase India's rising standing as a technology and space powerhouse. A successful moon mission dovetails with Modi's image of an ascendant India asserting its place among the global elite and would help bolster his popularity ahead of a crucial general election next year.
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