India's Chandrayaan-3 takes the moon's temperature near lunar south pole for 1st time
Monisha Ravisetti
Mon, August 28, 2023 at 12:35 PM EDT·3 min read
Tracks in lunar soil made by the Pragyan rover.
On Aug. 23, thanks to the success of Chandrayaan-3, India made a strong mark in space history. Not only did it become the first nation to land a spacecraft near the south pole of the moon, but also the fourth to create imprints on Earth's gleaming companion at all. However, the lunar lander's touchdown was only step one of its ultimate story.
Since reaching the moon's south pole,
Chandrayaan-3 has been hard at work – having
deployed a rover named
Pragyan to explore the cratered surface, harnessed integrated cameras to send back videos of its environment and even started completing research objectives planned for a
two-week stay on the orb.
On Saturday (Aug. 26), for instance, scientists with the Indian Space Research Organization presented a
video on X (formerly known as Twitter) of Pragyan roaming around the mission's landing point, which has been named the Shiv Shakti Point. In the video, the gold-colored moon explorer is seen on the other end of two delicate tracks it has created in lunar soil since exiting the lander that ushered it over there, named Vikram. The gingerly way Pragyan treads on a desolate gray world is almost charming.
Shortly after releasing this update, ISRO also posted a sort of
checklist on X saying that, after successful completion of a safe and soft landing as well as Pragyan's deployment, Chandrayaan-3 has begun conducting scientific experiments on site. "All payloads are performing normally," the agency posted on X.
