NEW DELHI, India — The first lunar probe from India landed on the moon Friday as part of a two-year mission aimed at laying the groundwork for further Indian space expeditions, the Indian Space Research Organization said.
ISRO chairman G. Madhavan Nair said cameras on board have been transmitting images of the moon to Indian space control, the Press Trust of India news agency reported.
Chief among the lunar mission’s goals is mapping not only the surface of the moon but what lies beneath. If successful, India will join what is shaping up to be a 21st-century space race with Chinese and Japanese crafts already in orbit around the moon.
The unmanned moon mission was launched from the Sriharikota space center in southern India on Oct. 22. The box-shaped lunar probe carried a video imaging system, a radar altimeter and a mass spectrometer.
The Associated Press
