There have been over a hundred moon missions in the history of the world–and the Chandrayaan-3 is Earth’s latest. On August 23, 2023, India became the first to land on the moon’s south pole. Most missions before have focused on the equator of the moon. The South Pole is interesting to scientists now because they have discovered there is water ice in the craters, also called the permanently shadowed areas, of the moon. The ice could end up being used as drinking water, fuel, and oxygen extraction.
The Chandrayaan-3 began its journey on July 14, 2023, taking a whopping 40 days to reach its destination. This is unusual, seeing as NASA can get to the moon in four days and Roscosmos (Russia) can get to the moon in about five and a half days. This is because the ISRO (India) has significantly less powerful engines and a smaller budget. The Chandrayaan-3 cost around 75 million dollars, which is a lot, but is nothing compared to NASA’s upcoming moon mission, which has a budget of 4.1 billion dollars.
The ISRO has said two out of three of the objectives have been met:
X Land safe and softy on the moon
X Rover moving around the moon as it should
O Conduct scientific research about the water and oxygen on the moon
Within the next two weeks, the research will conclude. If they could really use what they find for fuel, it would be a much cleaner and better alternative to the fuel we use now that is destroying our atmosphere. The world excitedly waits to see how this mission could change the earth.