Chandrayaan-3 | How NASA, ESA will support ISRO during the Moon landing on August 23

NASA and the European Space Agency have been supporting ISRO to monitor the Chandrayaan-3’s health since its launch on July 14, 2023

Since the launch of the Chandrayaan-3 mission on July 14, the ground stations of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) and the European Space Agency (ESA) have been supporting Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) to monitor the spacecraft’s health.

“Since the launch of Chandrayaan-3, ESA has been supporting the mission by utilising two of the ground stations in the ESTRACK network to track the satellite in its orbit, receive telemetry from the spacecraft and forward it to the Mission Operations Centre in Bengaluru, and forward commands sent from Bengaluru to the flying satellite,” Ramesh Chellathurai, ground operations engineer at ESOC Darmstadt, Germany told The Hindu.

The ESA’s 15-metre antenna in Kourou, French Guiana, and the 32-metre antenna belonging to Goonhilly Earth Station, U.K., were selected for the support, based on their technical capabilities as well as their periods of geometric visibility to the satellite.

“These two stations have been communicating with the Chandrayaan-3 mission on a regular basis, providing a complete communication channel between the Mission Operations Team in Bengaluru and the Chandrayaan-3 satellite,” Mr. Chellathurai added.

Now, with the Chandrayaan-3’s Lander making an attempt to touch down on the lunar surface on August 23, the support of the ground stations of these agencies becomes even more crucial.

The ESA’s 35-metre deep space antenna in New Norcia, Australia, a third ground station in the ESTRACK network, has been set-up to track and communicate with the Lander Module during the Lunar Descent phase.

The New Norcia antenna will serve as a back-up for ISRO’s own ground station during the descent. It will receive information about the Lander Module’s health, location and trajectory in parallel with the ISRO station.