“The rover has completed its tasks. It is now safely parked and in rest mode” with the end of daylight on that part of the moon, the Indian Space Research Organization said in a statement.
The payloads of the Chandrayaan-3 rover are turned off, and the collected data was transmitted to Earth through the lander, the statement also indicates.
However, there is no information on the result of searches for signs of frozen water on the lunar surface, which could help future astronaut missions, as a potential source of drinking water or to make fuel for rockets.
Last week, the space agency said the lunar rover confirmed the presence of sulfur, and detected several other elements, such as aluminum, iron, calcium, chromium, titanium, manganese, oxygen and silicon on the surface.
“Currently, the battery is fully charged. The solar panel is oriented to receive light at the next sunrise, scheduled for September 22, 2023. The receiver is kept on. We hope that the awakening will be successful for another set of missions,” the statement adds.
The Indian Express newspaper reported that the electronics on board the Indian lunar mission were not designed to withstand very low temperatures, such as those below minus 120 degrees that occur during the lunar night, which lasts for more than 14 Earth days.
The data sent to Earth will be analyzed by Indian scientists, in a first phase, and then by the world community, Pallava Bagla, a science writer and co-author of books on Indian space exploration, told the newspaper.
After a failed attempt to land on the moon in 2019, India last week joined the United States, the Soviet Union and China as the fourth country to reach this milestone.
2023-09-03 19:10:00
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