2y ago

Chandrayaan-3: The moment India's lunar rover Pragyaan stepped out for Moonwalk

www.bbc.com /news/world-asia-india-66613688

India's space agency Isro's new footage shows Chandrayaan-3's rover Pragyaan for the first time ever.

8 comments

Any chance the rover take a look at the russian disaster crash?
- I don't think so. That'll be a big deviation from the goal and even a single maneuver are costly when you're controlling rovers that far off
I don't think the unmanned rover is doing any stepping or walking.
- I get that this is a big deal but why do the headlines need to fluff it up to make it seem like there is a human out there? When do we ever say that our rovers on Mars are going for a Mars walk or stepping off their landing platform? If it's wheels they are rolling or going for a drive! It's no wonder that trust in news media is declining when there are editors who think this kind of bullshit can fly in a science headline.
  
  I see that this was published out of the BBC's Delhi offices. I guess the writing makes sense now.
This is the best summary I could come up with:
It shows Pragyaan (Sanskrit for wisdom) exiting the lander by sliding down a ramp and taking first steps on the lunar surface.
With this, India joins an elite club of countries to achieve a soft landing on the Moon, after the US, the former Soviet Union and China.
On Thursday, the Indian Space Research Organisation (Isro) said the 26kg rover had "ramped down" from the lander and "India took a walk on the Moon!
Pragyaan - which moves at a speed of 1cm per second - is now roaming around the rocks and craters, gathering crucial data and images to be sent back to Earth for analysis.
The rover is carrying two scientific instruments which will try to find out what minerals are present on the lunar surface and study the chemical composition of the soil.
Pragyaan will communicate only with the lander which will send the information to the orbiter from Chandrayaan-2 - which is still circling the Moon - to pass it on to the Earth for analysis.
The original article contains 461 words, the summary contains 170 words. Saved 63%. I'm a bot and I'm open source!
That was anticlimactic

8 comments