why is it so impressive that India landed on the South side of the Moon?
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**Logistics**: It’s much easier and safer to land near the moon’s equator, as the earth and moon are somewhat aligned along each other’s equators. An equatorial lunar landing doesn’t require many mid-course corrections. This is why most of the NASA Apollo and Surveyor landings were near the moon’s equator – it’s safer and more efficient to do that. Getting a lander to touch down at one of the poles requires a lot of change in the lander’s trajectory along the way, which requires more fuel, tighter telemetry, and the risk of loss is greater. So that’s the logistical challenge.
**Science**: There’s an exploratory interest in the south pole because it has tall craters that shield most of the bottom of those craters from sunlight (the lunar north pole doesn’t have this type of geology). In some cases, there are craters at the south pole that have bottoms that *never* see sunlight. It’s theorized that water ice (or measurable traces of water ice) could still be at the bottom of those south polar craters, as they don’t get much sunlight. Understanding the origin of the earth-moon system’s water ice would be an important discovery for understanding the origins of life.
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