Vikram LG Communication System Can Be Disabled During Hard Landing

A hard landing on the moon's surface might have disabled the communication system of the ISRO Vikram lander, began to believe former scientists of the space organization, no contact not being established with the LG more than a week after the satellite 's smooth landing attempt. lunar surface.

ISRO has been try to communicate with the undercarriage since contact was lost at 335 meters from the moon's surface – just seconds before landing -, the LG was moving at a vertical speed of 59 m / sec or 212 km / h and a horizontal speed of 48.1 m / sec or 173 km / h, which is much higher than the optimal landing speed of almost zero m / s.

According to Mr. Annadurai, a former ISRO scientist and project director for the Chandrayaan 1 lunar mission, the factors contributing to loss of contact with the LG lander could be the terrain where Vikram landed and the landing position and speed of the landing gear.

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"A combination of different terrains from those targeted with a non-nominal lander orientation may result in the loss of" correct "data in the last leg above 335 meters. However, if we see the complete data closely to the last bit received on the ground, we can better explain the scene. I hope that ISRO will definitely do it to understand, "said former director of U R Rao Space Center.

"The difference between the moon and the earth is only 1.25 seconds. There is a permanent loss of communication, which means a hard landing of the LG, which prevents communication with the orbiter and the earth, "said P Ve Veararaghavan, former director of the Vikram Space Center Sarabhai of ISRO ,.

On Tuesday, ISRO said that "Vikram LG was located by the Chandrayaan-2 Orbiter, but no communication with it yet.All possible efforts are made to establish communication with the LG, which suggests that efforts were still underway to establish contact with the LG.

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Kiran Kumar, former president of ISRO, said Thursday that Vikram 's lander had given no signal to ISRO. He also indicated that the communication break with the undercarriage had occurred just before touchdown.

The LG was equipped with a communication link with the Chandrayaan-2 orbiter, which remains in orbit around the moon, and to earth stations. The telemetry, tracking, and control network between the lander and the Indian Deep Space Network ground station was in the S band.

"The LG Vikram has tracked the expected descent trajectory from its 35 km orbit to just under 2 km above the surface. All the systems and sensors of the LG were working perfectly up to this point and have proven many new technologies such as variable thrust propulsion technology used in the LG, said the # 39; ISRO.