The Indian Space Research Organisation (Isro) announced last Saturday that their rover Pragyan, which landed on the moon two weeks ago, has now entered sleep mode. This occurred as one of the moon’s two-week-long nights set in.
Pragyan is powered by an electric motor, with its batteries being charged by the spacecraft’s built-in solar panels. Pragyan’s batteries are now fully charged, and its radio receiver remains active. They hope that the spacecraft will survive the long night on the moon, a period lasting two weeks during which temperatures can plummet to -120 degrees Celsius.
On September 22, Isro plans to attempt waking up Pragyan again. The goal of the entire moon mission, Chandrayaan-3, was to land on the moon and have the rover perform observations during the two weeks that have passed since the landing. If they succeed in reactivating Pragyan, it will undoubtedly be seen as a bonus.
In the video above, you can see some images of Pragyan taken by the moon lander Vikram.