NASA releases pics of India's moon landing site

Washington: India's Moon rover Vikram, which lost contact moments before it was to touch down on the lunar surface earlier this month, had a "hard landing", American space agency Nasa said.

New pictures from a Nasa spacecraft show the targeted landing site of the Vikram rover, but its precise location was not yet determined.

The images were taken at dusk, and were not able to locate the lander.

India would have been the fourth nation to make a soft landing on the Moon if the landing mission was successful. While the lander approached the Moon as normal, an error occurred about 2.1km (1.3 miles) from the surface, Indian space officials said.

On Friday, Nasa tweeted the images of the targeted landing site of the Indian module.

Nasa said the targeted site was located about 600km (370 miles) from the South Pole in a "relatively ancient terrain".

"Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) passed over the landing site on 17 September and acquired a set of high resolution images of the area; so far the team has not been able to locate or image the lander," the space agency said in a statement.

"It was dusk when the landing area was imaged and thus large shadows covered much of the terrain; it is possible that the Vikram lander is hiding in a shadow. The lighting will be favorable when LRO passes over the site in October and once again attempts to locate and image the lander."

India's first Moon mission - Chandrayaan-1 in 2008 - carried out the first and most detailed search for water on the lunar surface using radars.