The failure of Russia’s Luna-25 Moon mission will have no impact on ISRO’s Chandrayaan-3, according to top Indian space scientists.
The Luna-25 spacecraft crashed on the Moon after it spun into an uncontrolled orbit, Russia’s Roscosmos space agency said on August 20.
“It does not have any impact,” K Sivan, who was heading ISRO when the Chandrayaan-2 mission was launched in 2019, told news agency PTI when asked if ISRO would be under additional pressure ahead of the soft landing after the Russian setback.
Chandrayaan-3 mission’s lander module with a rover in its belly is expected to touch down on Moon around 6:04 pm on Wednesday, ISRO said on Sunday.
“It (Chandrayaan-3 mission) is going on as per plan. It (soft landing) will be done accordingly,” K Sivan said, adding, “We are hoping that this time (unlike Chandrayaan-2) it will be successful”.
Former ISRO Chairman G Madhavan Nair dismissed talks in some quarters that India and Russia were engaged in a race to the Moon and termed the crash-landing of Luna-25 as unfortunate.
“I know the (lander) module. It was ready way back in 2008. When I visited the lab (in Russia), they showed me the module. They didn’t have the resources to fly (then), so it had been kept in cold storage for a long time. Now they had resources (to launch),” he told PTI.
Ruling out any impact on the Chandrayaan-3 mission launched on July 14, Mr Nair said India’s venture is totally self-sufficient and “we are not dependent on them (Russia)”.
