Moon mission

TWO decades after the then Prime Minister, Atal Bihari Vajpayee, announced the Chandrayaan programme, India has launched its third lunar mission. The sky-high expectations have been summed up by PM Narendra Modi: ‘Chandrayaan-3 scripts a new chapter in India’s space odyssey. It soars high, elevating the dreams and ambitions of every Indian.’ He has rightly given credit to Indian scientists for this landmark achievement in the space sector. Considering the massive pre-launch buzz, the smooth takeoff of Chandrayaan-3 — which piggybacked ISRO’s heavy lift launch vehicle ‘Fat Boy’ LVM3-M4 — has made the entire nation heave a sigh of relief.

It’s expected to be a challenging month-long journey for the moon-bound space vehicle. The soft landing of the payload is, of course, the most crucial phase of the mission. If all goes well, India would emulate the US, the erstwhile USSR and China — the nations which have conducted a controlled lunar landing. The all-important question is: will Chandrayaan-3 avert the fate of its predecessor? The Chandrayaan-2 mission of 2019 was a classic case of ‘so near and yet so far’. Things had looked good as the lander ‘Vikram’ — named after the father of India’s space programme, the late Vikram Sarabhai — had successfully got separated from the orbiter in preparation for a landing on the moon. However, at an altitude of merely 2.1 km from the lunar surface, the ground stations had lost communication with ‘Vikram’, which was destroyed in a crash near the site where Chandrayaan-3 will attempt a touchdown.

Hopefully, lessons learnt from the abrupt and heartbreaking end of Chandrayaan-2 will ensure a positive outcome this time. It is imperative that the mission team be prepared well for the worst-case scenario. At stake is India’s ambitious goal of expanding its footprint in space, a strategically important domain that is witnessing intense global competition.