Vikram had hard landing, NASA releases high-resolution images of Chandrayaan 2 landing site

Vikram had a "hard landing", NASA said on Friday, as it released high-resolution images captured by its reconnaissance orbiter of the Moon's unchartered south pole where the Chandrayaan 2 lander attempted to soft-land during the ambitious mission three weeks ago.

The module had attempted a soft landing on a small patch of lunar highland smooth plains between Simpelius N and Manzinus C craters before losing communication with ISRO on September 7. The site was about 600 km from the south pole in a relatively ancient terrain, according to the US space agency.

"Vikram had a hard landing and the precise location of the spacecraft in the lunar highlands has yet to be determined, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration said.

The scene was captured from a Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter Camera (LROC) Quickmap fly-around of the targeted landing site image width is about 150 kilometres across the centre."