Earlier today, ISRO made history as its Chandrayaan-3 mission successfully landed on the Moon's south pole, considered an unexplored region rich in water ice. In the process, India became the first and only country to land on the South Pole of Earth's only natural satellite, leading to a massive spike in viewership on YouTube, largely thanks to Indian viewers.
In what many are labeling the latest Moon race, India became the first nation to 'reach this part of the lunar surface in one piece.' This came just days after a Russian lunar landing failed, meaning it has begun exploring an area of the celestial body that has remained unvisited so far. A lander named Vikram and a rover — Pragyan — landed in the Moon's southern polar region on Wednesday.
This hype around this mission, which made India only the fourth country to ever land on the Moon, saw YouTube filled with Indian channels that became highly active and helped it hit a significant 13.2M Peak Viewers for the day. The platform also hit a 2023 high of 4.4M Average Viewers for a single day thanks to ISRO's feat, its highest number since the start of 2022.
Moreover, when looking at the most popular channels on the Google-owned site for the day, the top six entries are all Indian, with the leader being the official handle of the country's Prime Minister, Narendra Modi. The remaining five consist of some of the most prominent Hindi and English television news channels in the Asian nation.
What has made the Chandrayaan-3's success so satisfying for the Indian public is the continued ability of the Indian Space Research Organization to send various projects into orbit at frugal costs. When asked about the same at a press conference, S Somanath, Director of ISRO, said:
“I won’t disclose such secrets. We don’t want everyone else to become so cost-effective!”
With Russia and India done with their recent launches, the focus now shifts to another lunar mission that goes up on Friday, August 26. The project, called Smart Lander for Investigating Moon (SLIM), comes from Japan’s space agency, JAXA, and aims to test the East Asian country’s lunar landing technologies. So far, no landing date for the mission has been announced.