NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) has taken a fresh set of pictures under better lighting conditions of the area where the Indian moon lander Vikram likely ended up and experts will be making a rigorous search for it, according to LRO Project Scientist Noah Petro. "The lighting conditions on Monday were much more favorable, (with) less shadow in the region" compared to last month, Petro told IANS on Wednesday.
Scientists were not able to locate the Vikram in the pictures taken during the LRO's last flyover on September 17, when it was dusk on the moon and the long shadows that covered much of the terrain may be hidden in it, NASA said at that time. "We flew over the landing site on Monday and the camera team is still evaluating images, so we should know more in the next few days," Noah said. "We will do a careful search, we will be as rigorous as possible" and "we will find out soon" what happened to the Vikram moon lander, said Petro, who is based at the Goddard Space Flight Center in Maryland near Washington.
"This is a large area, we don't know exactly where we have to look. So it will take some time to search the images because we are looking over a very, very large area," he added. Vikram lost contact with the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) following its launch from Chandraayan 2 moon orbiter on September 6 and likely landed in an area around the moon's South Pole. LRO will next fly around the region on November 10 and it will be another good opportunity with favorable lighting conditions for pictures, Petro said.
Meanwhile, Nasa's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter took a fresh set of pictures of the south pole region on October 14 under better lighting conditions as compared to the first set of images taken on September 17, when it was dusk on Moon and long shadows covered much of the terrain. Nasa experts are still analyzing the images sent by LRO as the area captured is vast and are making "a rigorous search" to look for the Vikram lander, says LRO project scientist Noah Petro, an agency report said. He said that LRO will next fly over the south pole region on November 10.
During the final descent on September 7, Vikram had made a hard landing on the moon surface and the Isro control room lost contact with the lander. An expert committee of Isro has been looking into the reasons for the "communication loss" with the lander during the final moments and is likely to submit the probe report to the PMO.
Scientists were not able to locate the Vikram in the pictures taken during the LRO's last flyover on September 17, when it was dusk on the moon and the long shadows that covered much of the terrain may be hidden in it, NASA said at that time. "We flew over the landing site on Monday and the camera team is still evaluating images, so we should know more in the next few days," Noah said. "We will do a careful search, we will be as rigorous as possible" and "we will find out soon" what happened to the Vikram moon lander, said Petro, who is based at the Goddard Space Flight Center in Maryland near Washington.
"This is a large area, we don't know exactly where we have to look. So it will take some time to search the images because we are looking over a very, very large area," he added. Vikram lost contact with the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) following its launch from Chandraayan 2 moon orbiter on September 6 and likely landed in an area around the moon's South Pole. LRO will next fly around the region on November 10 and it will be another good opportunity with favorable lighting conditions for pictures, Petro said.
Meanwhile, Nasa's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter took a fresh set of pictures of the south pole region on October 14 under better lighting conditions as compared to the first set of images taken on September 17, when it was dusk on Moon and long shadows covered much of the terrain. Nasa experts are still analyzing the images sent by LRO as the area captured is vast and are making "a rigorous search" to look for the Vikram lander, says LRO project scientist Noah Petro, an agency report said. He said that LRO will next fly over the south pole region on November 10.
During the final descent on September 7, Vikram had made a hard landing on the moon surface and the Isro control room lost contact with the lander. An expert committee of Isro has been looking into the reasons for the "communication loss" with the lander during the final moments and is likely to submit the probe report to the PMO.
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