India nails lunar landing, becoming first nation to park a spacecraft on moon's south pole

India became the fourth nation to pull off a successful soft lunar landing and the first to park in one piece on the moon's south pole Wednesday.

The Indian Space Research Organization set down the Chandrayaan-3 without incident — unlike Russia, whose unmanned Luna-25 spacecraft "ceased to exist as a result" of its Aug. 19 collision.

The Indian vessel landed around 8:30 a.m. ET in a region of great interest to scientists where ice resides in permanently shadowed craters, reported the Washington Post.

Ian Whittaker, a senior lecturer in physics at Nottingham Trent University, told Al Jazeera that the Chandrayaan-3's landing opens up possibilities for future lunar bases.

"Landing on the south pole, or near the south pole area, is actually really important because it’s the sort of area we’d be looking for a lunar base," said Whittaker. "There’s water there, which was one of the findings of Chandrayaan-1. This water can be used for a lot of things. We could also look for building materials."

Knowledge of the presence of water on the moon was resultant, in part, from a NASA instrument carried by one of Chandrayaan-3's predecessors, which had detected hydroxyl hidden in the lunar shade, reported the BBC.

That predecessor, the Chandrayaan-1, crash-landed on the moon on Nov. 14, 2008, near the Shackleton crater at the south pole.

The sequel, Chandrayaan-2, managed to enter the lunar orbit in August 2019 but deviated from its intended trajectory owing to a software glitch and crashed.

The ISRO confirmed Tuesday that the Chandrayaan-3, launched on July 14 from the Satish Dhawan Space Center in the south Indian state of Andhra Pradesh, was on schedule and "smooth sailing is continuing," reported CNN.

That smooth sailing was caught on film:

Watch: The moon's surface from India's lunar probe at it flies to landing zoneyoutu.be

The entire mission cost $75 million, less than half of what Russia's Luna-25 cost to blow to smithereens and roughly equivalent to the unit cost of five F-16A/B jet fighters.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who joined some of his nation's 1.42 billion souls remotely from the BRICS summit in South Africa, said, "My dear family, when we see history being made in front of us, it makes our life blessed. ... This moment is the announcement of an advanced India. These moments are of invention and phenomenal growth. ... We had taken a pledge on earth and realized it on the moon."

The prime minister added, "This success belongs to all of humanity."

NASA Administrator Bill Nelson congratulated India on doing what American pulled off with a manned crew and basic computers 54 years ago, writing, "Congratulations ISRO on your successful Chandrayaan-3 lunar South Pole landing! And congratulations to India on being the 4th country to successfully soft-land a spacecraft on the Moon. We're glad to be your partner on this mission.

Josef Aschbacher, director general of the European Space Agency, stated, "What a way to demonstrate new technologies and achieve India’s first soft landing on another celestial body. ... Well done. I am thoroughly impressed."

The Kremlin also commended India on its success, stating, "This is a big step forward in space exploration and, of course, a testament to the impressive progress made by India in the field of science and technology."

Once the dust settles around the spacecraft, which will apparently take hours, Pragyaan, a rover aboard the vessel, will exit the Chandrayaan-2 and commence its moon walk at a breakneck pace of 0.39 inches per second.

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