NASA Will Keep Searching For Our Chandrayaan-2 Vikram Moon Lander

The world is showing support for India’s Vikram moon lander when it attempted to land on the lunar surface on September 6. However, not everything went as expected. Vikram lost contact with the mission control just above the surface and we are all hoping to learn what’s happened to it.

On Tuesday, the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter of NASA flew over the site where Chandrayaan-2 Vikram aimed to land on, taking a number of photos of that area.

John Keller, LRO's deputy project scientist, cited a statement from NASA that confirmed the orbiter shot the images with its camera:

Currently, the photos are being validated, analyzed, and reviewed by NASA. The orbiter flew over the site when it was near lunar dusk, which means the area was mostly in shadow.

It’s uncertain where Vikram ended up exactly and if it had crashed or landed intact. ISRO hasn’t managed to contact the lander. India hoped to become the world’s fourth country to soft-land a spacecraft successfully on the Moon. In April, Israel made the same attempt but the Beresheet mission it launched crashed on arrival. Also in April, LRO successfully took a photo of the crash site.

This won’t be the only attempt of LRO to find Vikram, the orbiter will fly over this area again on October 14. It’s expected that the lighting condition on that day would be better. The space agency said that it will release the result of the flyover this week as soon as it can.