Vikram Lander was scheduled to make soft landing on the far side of the moon on September 7.
The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) on Tuesday thanked the country for standing by it after the agency lost contact with Chandrayaan 2 Mission lander Vikram earlier this month and promised to keep going forward.
Vikram was scheduled to make soft landing on the far side of the moon on September 7. However, minutes before its scheduled soft-landing at 1.55, the communication with the lander was lost. It was 2.1 km above the moon's surface when it lost contact with the ground station at ISRO headquarters in Bengaluru, ISRO said.
The entire country stood by the space agency during the difficult time. A picture of Prime Minister Narendra Modi hugging ISRO Chairman K Sivan became a symbol of how the country felt after the setback.
In a tweet on Tuesday, ISRO said, "Thank you for standing by us. We will continue to keep going forward — propelled by the hopes and dreams of Indians across the world!"
Chandrayaan-2 mission took off from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre in Sriharikota on July 22. After revolving around the Earth's orbit for nearly 23 days, the spacecraft began its journey towards the moon on August 14.
The Vikram Lander successfully separated from Chandrayaan-2 Orbiter on September 2 and started its journey towards the lunar surface.
A successful soft landing on moon would have made India the fourth country to place a spacecraft on the lunar surface after the then USSR, the US and China. India would have made India the first country to reach close to the lunar South Pole.
Even after losing contact with the lander, ISRO has not lost hope and is still trying to contact it. Last week, Vikram Lander was located by the orbiter of Chandrayaan 2 and Mr Sivan said all possible efforts were being made to establish communication.
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