Chandrayaan-3: ISRO Releases 1st Pic of Vikram Lander Taken By Pragyan Rover

Bengaluru: Chandrayaan-3’s rover, Pragyan, has just shared an image of the lander Vikram, the first that it has clicked using its Navigation camera – the first picture it has taken since its moon landing. Previously, all media had been sourced from the lander Vikram.

The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) captioned this snapshot as the “image of the mission.” Developed by Bengaluru’s Laboratory for Electro-Optics Systems (LEOS), the rover’s NavCams are responsible for this feat.

Chandrayaan-3 Mission:

Smile, please📸!

Pragyan Rover clicked an image of Vikram Lander this morning.

The 'image of the mission' was taken by the Navigation Camera onboard the Rover (NavCam).

NavCams for the Chandrayaan-3 Mission are developed by the Laboratory for… pic.twitter.com/Oece2bi6zE

— ISRO (@isro) August 30, 2023

Last week marked a historic milestone as Chandrayaan-3’s Vikram successfully landed on the moon’s surface, positioning India as the fourth nation to achieve this feat. Notably, it accomplished the unprecedented feat of landing on the unexplored south pole of the moon.

Fresh off this achievement, the rover Pragyan has detected sulphur near the lunar South Pole. Additionally, it identified elements like aluminium, calcium, iron, chromium, titanium, manganese, silicon, and oxygen.

ISRO reported that the Chandrayaan-3 Rover’s Laser-Induced Breakdown Spectroscopy (LIBS) instrument performed in-situ measurements of the lunar surface’s elemental composition near the south pole. This is groundbreaking as it confirmed the presence of sulphur, a finding beyond the capabilities of orbiters’ instruments.