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The sun sets over India
first attempt at lunar landing. As night fell on the lunar south pole
September 20, scientists hope that the Vikram solar powered lander will contact
Earth before the end of a lunar day have been wiped out.
Officials of the Indian space
The ISRO agency thinks that Vikram's lander died after a shock with the
lunar surface on September 6th. The probe lost contact
shortly before he had to touch the south pole of the moon (SN:
09/06/19), according to Times of
India.
Yet there was hope that
Vikram or his embedded rover would pull himself together and restore contact. ISRO spent
two weeks – the equivalent of a lunar day – trying to communicate with Vikram.
The lander and his rover, Pragyan, were designed to last a lunar day before
the lack of sun and the cold temperatures closed them.
ISRO stated that its
Chandrayaan 2 orbiter took pictures
September 10th, showing the landing gear flat or tilted to the side. Those
the images, however, have not been made public.
Lunar recognition of NASA
Orbiter also flew over the landing site on 17 September. But 'lunar local time
was near dusk; large shadows covered much of the area, "said the space agency in
an email. "The exact location of the lander was not known. The lander can therefore
not be in the camera field. NASA said it would look again in October
14, when the sun is higher in the lunar sky.
Once the sun is completely down at the Vikram landing site, temperatures will drop to around -180 ° C for another two weeks. The electronics of the solar powered lander should not survive the freezing night.
ISRO has not yet issued an official statement.
But the Time of India reported on
September, the team that analyzed the failure of the mission believes that it was taken seriously.
an error in the automatic landing program of the spacecraft. The newspaper
quoted an unnamed scientist as saying that the lander may have started spinning
on its way to the lunar surface so the thrusters are meant to slow the descent
instead accelerated.
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