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[ad_1] NEW DELHI: In a race for making the first footprint in the uncharted territory of the south pole of Moon, Russia’s Luna-25 mission, which was launched on August 11 — 28 days after India’s Chandrayaan-3 lifted off from Sriharikota on July 14, is likely to make a soft landing on the Moon on Monday (August 21) if everything goes smoothly, just two days prior to the scheduled soft landing of India’s lander module. Russia's Luna-25 mission has entered the Moon orbit of Earth 's satellite, Russian space agency Roscosmos announced on Wednesday afternoon. It said all systems aboard Luna-25 are performing optimally with stable communication. 03:38 Chandrayaan-3 Mission: Vikram lander separates successfully, now landing on Moon on August 23 Since Wednesday, Luna-25 will now circle the Moon for around five days and then change course for a soft landing on the south pole on August 21. The exact landing site is at the Boguslawsky crater at 72.9°S 43.2°E (close to where Chand

[ad_1] NEW DELHI: With Isro's most powerful rocket LVM-3 carrying the Chandrayaan-3 module on its tip standing tall on the launchpad in Sriharikota and the lunarcraft raring to begin its Moon journey next Friday, India is on the cusp of "becoming the fourth country after the US, Russia and China to land on the Moon", space minister Jitendra Singh said. "After a quantum rise in our space expertise, India can no longer wait to be left behind in its march to the Moon," he said. After landing on Moon, the space minister said, the Chandrayaan-3 rover with six wheels will come out of the lander and is expected to work for 14 days on the lunar surface. "With the support of multiple cameras on the rover, we will be able to receive images," Singh said. The space minister said the primary objectives of the Chandrayaan-3 mission are threefold: to demonstrate safe and soft-landing on the lunar surface; to demonstrate rover roving on the Moon; and to cond

[ad_1] NEW DELHI: With just days left for the scheduled launch of India’s third Moon mission “any day after July 12”, Isro said on Wednesday that the “encapsulated assembly containing Chandrayaan-3 is mated with the LVM3 '' rocket. Isro is looking at launching the lunarcraft in the July 12-19 window and will make a second attempt at soft-landing on the south pole side of Moon, which, if successful, will put India in the elite club of three nations (US, Russia and China) with moon-landing capability. If the spacecraft is launched successfully next week, it will travel towards the Moon for over a month covering a distance of about 3.84 lakh km and will attempt a safe landing on the south pole side around August 23. Chandrayaan-3 is a follow-on mission to Chandrayaan-2. Unlike its predecessor, which carried an orbiter along with Vikram lander and Pragyan rover, Chandrayaan-3 is a composite of three modules: propulsion, lander and rover. The total weight of the spacecraft