India's Moon Exploration Program

vampyrbladez

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ISRO may have lost lander, rover: Official

8:14 HRS IST

Bengaluru, Sep 7 (PTI) ISRO may have lost Chandrayaan-2's Vikram lander and rover Pragyan housed inside it, a senior official of the space agency associated with the unmanned moon mission said here Saturday.

Earlier in the day, contact from the lander to the ground stations was lost during its powered descent to the Lunar surface minutes before the planned touch-down.

"Vikram lander descent was as planned and normal performance was observed up to an altitude of 2.1 km.

Subsequently, the communications from the lander to ground stations was lost," ISRO chief K Sivan said.

"The data is being analysed," he added.

Speaking to PTI, a senior official closely associated with the mission, said later: "There is no communication with the lander

It's as good as lost. There is no hope. Very, very difficult to re-establish contact".


The 1,471-kg lander of Chandrayaan-2 -- first Indian mission to explore the lunar terrain with home-grown technology -- is named Vikram after Dr Vikram A Sarabhai, the father of the Indian space programme.

The lander was designed to execute a soft landing on the lunar surface, and to function for one lunar day, which is equivalent to about 14 earth days.

Chandrayaan-2's 27-kg rover is a six-wheeled robotic vehicle named Pragyan, which translates to 'wisdom' in Sanskrit.

It's designed to travel up to 500 metres from the landing spot on the Moon and leverage solar energy for its functioning

The lander carried three scientific payloads to conduct surface and subsurface science experiments, while the rover carried two payloads to enhance our understanding of the lunar surface, according to ISRO

The mission life of the orbiter will be one year while that of the rover was to be one lunar day which is equal to 14 earth days.

http://ptinews.com/news/10833365_ISRO-may-have-lost-lander--rover--Official
 

ganesh177

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'Chandrayaan-2 achieved 95% of objective'

Last updated on: September 07, 2019 12:31 IST


Former Indian Space Research Organisation Chairman G Madhavan Nair said on Saturday the Chandrayaan-2 has achieved 95 per cent of its mission objectives, the lander's unsuccessful bid to touch-down on the lunar surface notwithstanding.

The former secretary in the Department of Space and ex-Space Commission Chairman noted that the orbiter is healthy and functioning normally in the Lunar orbit, and that Chandrayaan-2 had multiple objectives, including soft-landing.

"I think we need not worry too much...I will rate more than 95 per cent of the mission objectives have been achieved," Nair told PTI after lander 'Vikram' lost contact
with ground-stations during final descent to the Lunar surface in the early hours of Saturday.



"Already, orbiter is in space and it should do an excellent job of mapping," he added.

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Chandrayaan-2, a follow-on mission to the Chandrayaan-1 mission undertaken more than a decade ago,comprises an orbiter, lander (Vikram) and rover (Pragyan).

The 2,379-kg orbiter, with designed mission life of one year, carries eight scientific payloads for mapping the lunar surface and study the exosphere (outer atmosphere) of the Moon.

The orbiter payloads will conduct remote-sensing observations from a 100 km orbit.

According to ISRO, the lander carried three scientific payloads to conduct surface and subsurface science experiments, while the rover carried two payloads to enhance
our understanding of the lunar surface.

Nevertheless, Nair said the lander's contact-loss was highly disappointing, and he never expected such a scenario.

"It's disappointing for all of us. The entire country was looking forward to it."

He said the entire mission -- from the launch till the lander lost its communication with ground-stations at an altitude of to 2.1 km from the Moon's surface -- went like text-book precision.

"When you look at operation 2.1 km down below, it's really complex; half of us were keeping our fingers crossed because there are several instruments and thrusters will have to work very precisely; only then the final objective can be achieved," the former ISRO Chief said.

"If you start listing, there are at least ten points where it could have gone wrong. What has really gone wrong is difficult to predict now", he said.

"Only thing is in the last ten seconds (of the mission), there was a deviation in the trajectory and velocity path. Looking at the data available till that point I am sure ISRO will be able to identify (where things went wrong)," he added.

There could be any number of reasons, including sensor failure, on-board software anomaly and thrust deviation, for the loss of communication.

Earlier in the day, contact from the lander to the ground stations was lost during its powered descent to the Lunar surface minutes before the planned touch-down.

"Vikram lander descent was as planned and normal performance was observed up to an altitude of 2.1 km. Subsequently, the communication from the lander to ground-stations was lost," ISRO chief K Sivan said.

"The data is being analysed," he added.

Speaking to PTI, a senior official closely associated with the mission, said ISRO may have lost the lander and Pragyan rover housed inside it.

"There is no communication with the lander.It's as good as lost. There is no hope.


https://www.rediff.com/news/report/chandrayaan-2-achieved-95-of-objective-madhavan-nair/20190907.htm
 

ganesh177

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Didn't we successfully landed on chandrayaan 1 ?
So why was it a problem this time, i am just curious.
 

angeldude13

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Congrats to ISRO for the orbiter and as for the lander, we Indians are with you and we have total faith in your capability and we know you will do great next time.
Thanks to Mr K. Srinivas and entire team of chandrayaan 2.


That being said please stop giving too much attention to porkis.
For god sake they don't even have a space program to begin with.
 

afako

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https://www.dnaindia.com/india/repo...viser-decodes-mission-s-90-95-success-2788128

Latest update from GOI:

Taking it to Twitter in a series of tweets, Principal Scientific Adviser Dr. Krishnasamy Vijay Raghavan decodes the journey of Chandrayaan-2 from now on:

  • Since the launch of Chandrayaan-2 on July 22, 2019, India and the world watched its progress from one phase to the next with great expectation and excitement.
  • The Chandrayaan-2 mission is very complex, and a significant technological leap from previous missions of ISRO. This brought together an Orbiter, Lander and Rover to explore the unexplored south polar region of the Moon.
  • This unique mission, aimed at studying not just one area of the Moon but also its exosphere, the surface and sub-surface in a single mission.
  • The Orbiter has already been placed in its intended orbit around the Moon and shall enrich our understanding of the moon’s evolution, map minerals, water molecules in the polar regions, using its eight state-of-the-art scientific instruments.
  • The precise launch and mission management has ensured a long life of almost 7 years instead of the planned one year.

  • Here is a list of cutting-edge science that will come from the orbiter from ISRO.
  • The Orbiter camera is the highest resolution camera (0.3m) in any lunar mission so far and has already started providing high-resolution images which will be immensely useful to the global scientific community.
  • Orbiter camera: The pictures I saw this morning were truly extraordinary. TMC 2 is a miniature version of the Terrain Mapping Camera used onboard the Chandrayaan 1 mission.
  • TMcv2’s primary objective is mapping the lunar surface in the panchromatic spectral band (0.5-0.8 microns), high spatial resolution(5m), swathe(20 km from 100 km lunar polar orbit). Data will give clues about the Moon's evolution, prepare 3D maps of the lunar surface.
  • CLASS measures X-ray Fluorescence (XRF) spectra to detect elements such as Magnesium, Aluminium, Silicon, Calcium, Titanium, Iron, and Sodium. The XRF technique will detect these elements by measuring the characteristic X-rays they emit when excited by the Sun's rays.
  • XSM observes the X-rays emitted by the Sun and its corona, measures the intensity of solar radiation in these rays, and supports CLASS. Provides solar X-ray spectrum in the energy range of 1-15 ke
  • XSM will provide high-energy resolution and high-cadence measurements (full spectrum every second) of solar X-ray spectra as input for analysis of data from CLASS.
  • Imaging Infra-red spectrometer (IIRS) has two primary objectives: i. global mineralogical and volatile mapping of the Moon in the spectral range of ~0.8-5.0 µm for the first time, at the high resolution of ~20 nm.
  • IIRS second objective: Complete characterization of water/hydroxyl feature near 3.0 µm for the first time at high spatial (~80 m) and spectral (~20 nm) resolutions.
  • One more from IIRS: will also measure solar radiation reflected off the Moon's surface in 256 contiguous spectral bands from 100 km lunar orbit.
  • Dual-frequency (L and S) synthetic aperture radar (SAR) will provide enhanced capabilities compared to Chandrayaan 1's S-band miniSAR in areas such as: L-band for greater depth of penetration (About 5m — twice that of S-band).
  • SAR: Circular and full polarimetry — with a range of resolution options (2-75 m) and incident angles (9°-35°) — for understanding scattering properties of permanently shadowed regions.
  • SAR: The main scientific objectives of this payload are: High-resolution lunar mapping in the polar regions. Quantitative estimation of water-ice in the polar regions. Estimation of regolith thickness and its distribution.
  • Chandrayaan Atmospheric compositional explorer 2 (CHACE 2) will continue the CHACE experiment carried out by Chandrayaan 1.
  • CHACE 2 is a Quadrupole Mass Spectrometer (QMA) capable of scanning the lunar neutral exosphere in the mass range of 1 to 300 amu with the mass resolution of ~0.5 amu.
  • CHACE 2's primary objective is to carry out an in-situ study of the composition and distribution of the lunar neutral exosphere and its variability.
  • Dual Frequency Radio Science Experiment (DFRS) To study the temporal evolution of electron density in the Lunar ionosphere.
  • DFRS: Two coherent signals at X (8496 MHz), and S (2240 MHz) band are transmitted simultaneously from satellite, and received at ground-based deep station network receivers.
  • The Vikram Lander followed the planned descent trajectory from its orbit of 35 km to just below 2 km above the surface
  • All systems and sensors of the Lander functioned excellently until this point. Tested and proved many new technologies such as the variable thrust propulsion technology used in the Lander.
  • Success criteria were defined for each and every phase of the mission and so far 90 to 95% of the mission objectives have been accomplished and will continue to contribute to Lunar science. notwithstanding the loss of communication with the Lander.
  • Project review teams made presentations to mission management, Chaired by Dr. Sivan right through the early hours of today onward. They are already addressing causes and learning from the events.
  • After a moment of despondency, it is back to work!! It is inspirational to see this characteristic of science in collective action. Kudos to ISRO.
This is a very tech mission. Now just imagine the amount of tech we lost on the lander. ISRO chiefs tears had lots of value which we now understand.
 

here2where

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NO need, the Chandrayaan Orbitor will do that.
there was a fly-by earlier today of our orbiter above the probable landing site. Curious no updates yet.

Wish Vikram carried an on-board camera, then we could have got coverage like this -

 

A chauhan

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Don't know if a repost...


I am getting this via notifications :notsure:
 
Last edited:

varun9509

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We should have our own Indian deep space communication network... rather than rely on the COMPETITORS in space race for resources and their COMs
We haven't sent any satellite that far. May be when we do we would build one.

Sent from my YU5510 using Tapatalk
 

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