Slashdot Mirror
India's Chandrayaan Lands Impact Probe On the Moon
yaksha writes to tell us that the Indian Space probe, Chandrayaan, has become only the fourth nation to land a probe on the Moon. The 35-kg Moon Impact Probe touched down in what officials are describing as a "perfect operation." "Developed by ISRO's Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre of Thiruvananthapuram, the primary objective of MIP is to demonstrate the technologies required for landing a probe at the desired location on the moon. The probe will help qualify some of the technologies related to future soft landing missions. This apart, scientific exploration of the moon at close distance is also intended using MIP."
This does not change India's status as a "player" in that respect. It does not need very much range at all to hit Pakistan or China. It is so close to Pakistan that it would be -very- difficult for either side to retaliate in the case of a nuclear attack if there was any amount of hesitation, which does make the situation dangerous (for fear of false positive indicators of an attack) but this does not change that.
Chandrayaan-1 is an orbiter that will be in operation for some time. The Moon Impact Probe just rode along. One purpose for the impactor was to serve as part of a dress rehearsal for a later soft landing mission. From the source announcement: "Weighing 34 kg at the time of its launch onboard Chandrayaan-1, the box shaped MIP carried three instruments â" a video imaging system, a radar altimeter and a mass spectrometer. The video imaging system was intended to take the pictures of the moonâ(TM)s surface as MIP approached it. The radar altimeter was included to measure the rate of descent of the probe to the lunar surface. Such instruments are necessary for future lunar soft landing missions. And, the mass spectrometer was for studying the extremely thin lunar atmosphere."
Saddle up: Riding with Robots
Here are the first images from MIP.. Image 1 Image 2