Chandrayaan-3 lands at the lunar south pole
India becomes the fourth country to land on the Moon, and the first at its south pole.
- When
- Known to
- ± 12 hours
- Era
- Contemporary, Holocene
- Where
- Lunar south pole · 69.3700° S, 32.3500° E · Moon
Vikram touched down on 23 August 2023 at 69 degrees south, closer to the pole than any previous lander, four years after Chandrayaan-2 crashed on the same attempt and days after Russia's Luna 25 did. The mission cost about 75 million dollars. Its instruments confirmed sulphur in the regolith and measured a temperature gradient far steeper than expected in the top centimetres of soil.