Chandrayaan-3 On Moon: ISRO Makes History As Vikram Lander Successfully Lands On The Moon

India is on the moon as Chandrayaan-3 lander successfully touched the surface of the moon after the planned descent on Wednesday.

• Chandrayaan-3 has put India on the moon after the Vikram Lander landed successfully.

• After a month-long journey from India's Andhra Pradesh, Chandrayaan-3 has reached the lunar south pole.

• The Pragyan Rover will help ISRO look for ice water or frozen water on the surface of the moon.

India has created history by becoming the first country to reach the moon's south pole. Chandrayaan-3, India's latest lunar probe mission, has emerged successful as Vikram Lander, the lander carrying the Pragyan Rover, touched the surface of the moon after the descent began at 5.44 pm on Wednesday. The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) announced the spacecraft landed on the lunar south pole successfully, followed by a room full of scientists cheering and clapping at the country's space agency. This is the culmination of hundreds of thousands of events and religious gatherings that began to pray for the success of Chandrayaan-3 over the past few days.

"India is on the moon," said ISRO chief S

Somnath in a media briefing. "Chandrayaan-3 Mission: 'India, I reached my destination and you too!': Chandrayaan-3," ISRO posted on X, confirming that Vikram Lander has soft-landed on the surface of the moon. "This is a victory cry of a new India," said Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who was seen waving the Indian flag in a video call as he watched the landing from South Africa, where he is attending the BRICS summit.

Chandrayaan-3 stands about 2 metres tall and has a mass of just over 1,700 kg, roughly on par with an SUV. It is designed to deploy a smaller, 26-kg lunar rover, called the Pragyan Rover, which has navigation cameras to capture the findings on the moon's surface. It succeeds over the Chandrayaan-2, which was deployed over the moon but crashed during the landing in 2019. The latest moon mission also represents ISRO's tenacity as it establishes itself as a world-class space agency, especially at a time when Russia's first moon mission in 25 years, Luna-25, failed due to the lander's crash.

After travelling about 3.84 lakh kilometres for over 40 days, the Chandrayaan-3 spacecraft will allow the space agency to study the south pole, an uncharted region of the moon that is likely to have water. The Chandrayaan-3 is expected to remain functional for two weeks, running a series of experiments including a spectrometer analysis of the mineral composition of the lunar surface. If found, water on the moon could be instrumental in carrying out future lunar missions, as well as other probe missions. It could serve as drinking water after refinements to space travellers. The moon's water could also be broken down into hydrogen and oxygen, which could serve as fuel for spacecraft landing on the moon. There is also a possibility that the discovery of sufficient water could spur the development of human settlements on the moon.