Here it is: Indians are better than Russians. Three days after the failure of Luna-25, a probe that crashed on the surface of our natural satellite, the Chandrayaan-3 mission in turn attempted a smooth landing on Wednesday 23 August, and all went well until the last second. India has just joined a select group of countries capable of touching the surface of the moon without exploding. Only three space powers have successfully conducted the exercise to date: the Soviet Union and then the United States in 1966, and China in 2013.

Good start and radio silence

This is not the first time India has attempted a historic moon landing. The first mission, Chandrayaan-1, took off in 2008 to practice leaving Earth’s gravity and placing itself in orbit around our satellite. The probe has spent ten months circling the Moon mapping it, and dropping “crashers” onto its surface to practice aiming. That’s a good start. All that’s left is knowing how to set up the finish smoothly, and that’s a whole different ball game.

The Chandrayaan-2 mission, launched on July 22, 2019, separated into two spacecraft: an orbiter which keeps rotating around the Moon, while the lander “Vikram” descends to the surface, slowly… 2 km from the ground, it is sent its latest news to Earth, and never heard from again. We have to admit that Vikram has hit the surface too hard to survive. These are called crashes, and failures.

But India’s space agency – Isro – is keen to try the exercise again soon. Exactly like its predecessor model, the Chandrayaan-3 mission took off this summer, on July 14.

Get into lunar orbit

The 6 billion rupees (67 million euros) mission follows a long, fuel-efficient trajectory to the Moon, which is the first to pass into Earth orbit while checking that all of the probe’s instruments are functioning properly. Then Chandrayaan-3 was gradually transferred to our satellite. Isro announced on August 6 that the probe had correctly entered lunar orbit, by publishing several photos of the star visible to its camera. Chandrayaan-3 is in a circular orbit about 100 kilometers above the lunar surface.

On August 17, the Vikram lander separated from the propulsion module that brought it here. Then it positioned itself over its landing site near the South Pole. This place was chosen for its strategic importance: at the Moon’s South Pole, large amounts of water hide in the form of ice in perpetually shadowed craters. This water can later be used for astronaut crews who will set up a work base on the Moon, or even as raw material to set up a sort of rocket service station en route to Mars.

An explorer full of instruments

Vikram landed this Wednesday, August 23 at 14:34 Paris time, exactly as planned. He kept sending his messages to ground control throughout the descent: altitude 300 meters, then 150, then 30, 25, 12… And no loss of contact was observed, a sign that the lander was still remotely functioning. surface.

He now has to deploy a small explorer named Pragyan. Vikram and Pragyan are equipped with scientific instruments to study the lunar environment. Their life expectancy is fourteen Earth days, or one lunar day: when the Sun sets on the Moon, it gets very cold (around -200°C) and difficult to survive with electronic instruments.

India’s solar system exploration program is quite ambitious for the coming years. Starting in early September, the Aditya L1 mission should depart to observe the Sun up close. The Shukrayaan-1 probe will map Venus next year, while the Mangalyaan-2 mission will enter Mars orbit. 2024 should also be the year of India’s first manned flight, with a crew of three astronauts who will spend a short time in low Earth orbit (about 400 kilometers above sea level).

Update at 14:40 with moon landing.