India walks on Moon
In one of the most major moments of pride and joy for entire country since independence, India has become the fourth country to achieve a soft landing on the moon. Before India, Russia, the United States of America and China have achieved this remarkable feat.
Chandrayaan-3 has landed on the Moon after “20 minutes of terror” and the Vikram lander and Pragyan rover – carrying six scientific payloads between them – have one lunar day, or 14 Earth days, to gather enough data to satisfy the curiosities of scientists across the world.
This deadline is critical because after a fortnight the solar-powered Pragyan rover – which made its mark on the Moon late last night with ISRO declaring ‘India takes a walk on the Moon’ – will slow down as this is the extent of the ‘sunlight cycle’ on the lunar surface.
As a matter of fact, September 12, 1959, Russia, then known as the USSR, became the first country to achieve a successful lunar landing. This was a hard-landed spacecraft but the country managed to soft-land seven years later in 1966.
In 1966, the US soft-landed on the moon a few months after Russia. The US already has 11 soft landings which is the most in the world. That’s not all, US is the only country in the world to land twelve people on the moon through six space missions.
In 2013, China became the third country to land on the moon.
The Rs 600 crore Chandrayaan-3 mission was launched on July 14 on board the Launch Vehicle Mark-III (LVM-3) rocket and took 41 days to reach its destination.
India’s successful moon mission is not just India’s alone…this success belongs to all off humanity, and it will help moon missions by other countries in the future,” PM Modi said. “We can all aspire for the moon and beyond.