The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) announced on Friday that efforts are underway to establish communication with the Vikram lander and Pragyan rover as part of the Chandrayaan-3 mission. However, as of the latest update, no signals have been received from the lunar duo. ISRO reiterated its commitment to continuing its efforts to re-establish contact with the spacecraft.
Nilesh Desai, Director of Space Applications Centre, disclosed, "...Efforts are on to establish contact with the Lander and the Rover. It will automatically revive and send signals. Till now, no signals have come..." Desai also acknowledged that the mission's success hinges on a 50-50 chance, depending on whether the electronic systems can withstand the harsh cold temperatures.
Earlier plans to reactivate the rover and lander, which were originally scheduled for September 22 evening, have been pushed back to September 23, according to Desai.
Desai told news agency ANI, "We had initially scheduled the reactivation of the Pragyan rover and Vikram lander for the evening of September 22. However, due to unforeseen circumstances, we have rescheduled this critical operation for September 23."
Desai said that the plan was to reactivate the rover and lander in order to move the rover further on the Moon's surface. He said, "We had a plan to move the rover to almost 300-350 metres. But due to some reasons we couldn't. The rover has moved 105 metres till now. Last time, we moved it for 10 days on the surface of the moon."
The mission's Vikram lander and Pragyan rover made a successful landing on the moon's surface on August 23, marking their touchdown at the designated location now known as 'Shiv Shakti Point'. Following their successful lunar activities and experiments, both the rover and lander were placed into a sleep mode earlier this month. The rover entered sleep mode on September 2, followed by the lander on September 4, in preparation for the upcoming reactivation process on September 23.