Chandrayaan-3: What makes Moon's south pole so fascinating?

India is a few hours away from creating history. Chandrayaan-3, the third lunar mission of the country will attempt a soft landing on the moon's south pole today (Aug 23) at 6:04 pm IST. All eyes are on Chandryaan-s's Vikram Lander which also contains the Pragyan rover that will study the surface of the moon.

Ahead of the landing, the space agency said the Mission Operations Complex (MOX), located at the ISRO Telemetry, Tracking and Command Network (ISTRAC), is buzzing with energy and excitement.

A mission that was started as a dream by some scientists has now become the pride of the country’s commoners. The history will be made on August 23, when Chandrayaan-3’s Lander and Rover will land on moon’s lesser-known area- Lunar South.

Moon has always intrigued scientists, philosophers, space enthusiasts and commoners alike. Many attempts have been made in the past to reach the moon and to look for the probability of life on its surface. What has been even more fascinating for science buffs is its South Pole, which is the southernmost point on the Moon.

Moon’s South Pole: What makes it so fascinating?

Moon’s South Pole, also known as the lunar south pole is of special interest to scientists because of the occurrence of water ice in permanently shadowed areas around it. The lunar south pole has craters on its surface that are unique in their own way, as sunlight is not able to reach their interiors.

NASA even claims that some craters in the moon’s south pole have not received sunlight for billions of years and the temperatures here could dip as low as -203 degrees Celsius.

This is why these craters are cold traps that contain a fossil record of hydrogen, water ice, and other volatiles dating from the early Solar System. Considering these cold temperatures, the matter trapped in the southern lunar region wouldn’t have witnessed much change over the years and could thereby hold clues to early life.

These factors make the southern lunar pole fascinating for scientific investigations.

Explorations to Moon’s South Pole

Several nations have explored or tried to explore this particular region on the lunar south pole.

In 2008, ISRO developed a Moon Impact Probe (MIP), which separated from the moon-orbiting Chandrayaan-1 on 14 November 2008 at 20:06 IST and after nearly 25 minutes crashed as planned, near the rim of Shackleton Crater. Shackleton is an impact crater in the lunar south pole. With this mission, India became the first nation to hard land or impact the lunar south pole.

India's second lunar mission Chandrayaan-2, which was launched on 22 July 2019, attempted to soft-land on the south polar region of the moon. But unfortunately, the lander failed to land safely, losing communication barely 335 metres from the ground.

With the third instalment of the Chandrayaan series, India will attempt to soft land on the lunar south pole this time.

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