First Moon photos from Chandrayaan-3 expedition

The historic Chandrayaan-3 mission from India to the lunar South Pole has returned the first photographs of the Moon ahead of its expected landing later this month.

The spacecraft carrying the mission’s rover and lander successfully entered lunar orbit on Saturday (05 August), and the Indian space agency Isro immediately tweeted the first photographs of the Moon acquired from orbit.

The photographs show craters on the Moon that get larger as the spacecraft approaches the lunar surface.

The spacecraft has begun circling the Moon after nearly 10 days of orbiting Earth, and the rover and lander are slated to reach the lunar surface on 23 August.

Saturday’s accomplishment is ISRO’s third in a row of successfully inserting a spacecraft into lunar orbit.