• Source:PTI
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Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) chairman S Somanath on Tuesday said that Vikram, the lander of India's third lunar mission Chandrayaan-3 will make a soft-landing on the Moon's surface on August 23, even if two of its engines do not work.

Speaking about the lunar mission during a talk on ‘Chandrayaan-3: Bharat's Pride Space Mission', hosted by the non-profit organisation Disha Bharat, Somnath said that the entire design of the 'Vikram' has been made in a way that it can handle failures.

"If everything fails, if all the sensors fail, nothing works, still it (Vikram) will make a landing. That's how it has been designed--provided that the propulsion system works well," Somnath said as quoted by the news agency PTI.

Chandrayaan 3, India's third lunar exploration mission, aims to build upon the success of its predecessors, Chandrayaan 1 and Chandrayaan 2. It entered into lunar orbit on August 5. There will be three more de-orbiting manoeuvres -- exercises to bring it closer to the Moon so that Vikram lands on the Moon's surface on August 23.

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The de-orbiting manoeuvres will be carried out on August 9, August 14, and August 16 till its orbit reduces to 100 kmx100 km from the moon, said the ISRO chief.

"We have also made sure that if two of the engines (in Vikram) don't work this time also, it will still be able to land," the ISRO chairman said.

"So the whole design has been made to make sure that it (Vikram) should be able to handle many failures, provided the algorithms work properly," he added.

Somanath also explained that the biggest challenge before the ISRO team is to land horizontal 'Vikram' vertically on the moon.

According to Somanath, the lander will start moving horizontally as soon as it separates from the orbiter. It will be brought to a vertical attitude through a series of maneuvers in order to land safely on the Moon.

This is important as ISRO failed to get its lander to touch down safely on the Moon's surface during the Chandrayaan-2 mission.

"The ability to transfer from horizontal to vertical direction is the trick we have to play here. Here only we had the problem last time," Somanath said.

(With inputs from agency)