'Smile please': Pragyan clicks Vikram on moon

Shubhadeep Choudhury

New Delhi, August 30

ISRO on Wednesday shared two black and white pictures of the lander Vikram clicked by the navigation camera of the rover Pragyan.

Racing against time

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• As all five payloads are solar-powered, these will stop working on September 6 when night descends on moon
• ISRO, thus, is in a race against time to collect as much scientific data as possible till then

In the desolate lunar landscape, Vikram is seen standing with the sunlight shining on it sideways, producing an elongated shadow on the other side of the lander.

In one of the two photographs, the payload ChaSTE (Chandra’s Surface Thermo-Physical Experiment) and ILSA (Instrument for Lunar Seismic Activity), two of the three instruments aboard Vikram, are seen deployed on the lunar surface.

Rover’s 1st pic of lander

• Chandrayaan-3 mission’s Pragyan rover on Wednesday clicked Vikram lander’s image
• The ‘image of the mission’, shared by ISRO, was taken by Navigation Camera (NavCam) on board the Pragyan rover
• Detailed observations of lunar surface and in-situ scientific experiments are underway
• All payloads are solar-powered and will stop working on Sept 6

While posting the two images on X, ISRO gave a touch of humour. It wrote “Smile, please” as a photographer would tell a person who wants to be photographed. “Pragyan rover clicked an image of Vikram lander this morning. The ‘image of the mission’ was taken by the navigation camera on-board the rover (NavCam)… NavCams for the Chandrayaan-3 mission are developed by the Laboratory for Electro-Optics Systems (LEOS),” it wrote.