Instruments On Chandrayaan-3’s Vikram Lander And Pragyan Rover May Not Come Back To Life: IIA Astronomer

Chandrayaan-3: According to the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO), a reawakening of the Vikram lander and Pragyan rover is expected on September 22, 2023.

Chandrayaan-3's Pragyan rover was put into sleep mode on September 2, 2023, while the Vikram lander went off to sleep on September 4, 2023. Their payloads have been switched off. According to the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO), a reawakening of Vikram and Pragyan is expected on September 22, 2023. This is because the next lunar sunrise is expected to occur on September 22. Also, Pragyan's battery is fully charged, the receiver is kept on, and the solar panels have been oriented in such a way that they will receive the sunlight when the next lunar sunrise occurs. Similarly, Vikram's payloads have been kept on. However, according to Professor RC Kapoor, an astronomer at the Indian Institute of Astrophysics (IIA), the instruments onboard Vikram and Pragyan may not come back to life. But there is still some hope, he said, news agency ANI reported.

Dr Kapoor said that the rover and the lander have done their bit, and that their instruments have functioned properly and correctly, because of which ISRO has a large amount of data. While the instruments may not come back to life as they functioned in the previous cycle, there is still some hope, and there may be “good news”, the astronomer said. 

Dr Kapoor also said that the SUn has risen on the side whether the lander and the rover are located. He explained that the rover has been positioned in such a way that when the Sun rises, its solar panels will face the star. 

Chandrayaan-3 made a historic soft landing on the Moon on August 23, 2023, at around 6:02 pm IST, making India the first country to softly land a spacecraft on the lunar south pole. Chandrayaan-3 has provided ISRO with a multitude of scientific data. These scientific breakthroughs include creating the first temperature-depth profile on the Moon's south pole, confirming the presence of sulphur on the lunar south pole, discovering that the lunar plasma environment above the south pole is sparse, and detecting a potential lunar quake.