"Memorable moment," says Associate Project Director of Chandrayaan-3 mission

BENGALURU: Associate Project Director of the Chandrayaan-3 mission Kalpana on Wednesday said that it was a memorable moment for her and for the whole team after the Vikram lander carrying the Pragyaan rover in its belly touched down on the lunar surface.

"It is the most memorable moment for me and my team. This is what we have strived for the past so many years. We achieved our target," said Kalpana, The Indian Space Research Organisation’s (ISRO) Chandrayaan-3 landed successfully after a 40-day journey starting from the Satish Dhawan Space Center in Sriharikota.

India's success in landing the spacecraft on the Moon's south pole comes days after a Russian probe Luna-25 crashed in the same region. Chandrayaan-3 spacecraft put down the Vikram lander on the lunar surface, descending and tilted to a horizontal position ahead of landing.

The Chandrayaan-3 mission is the follow-up to the Chandrayaan-2 mission of 2019 when the Vikram lander crashed into the lunar surface. makes India the fourth country – after the US, China, and Russia – to have successfully landed on the moon’s surface, it has earned a place in record books as the first to touchdown on the south side of Earth’s only natural satellite.