Even as India hailed space enthusiast Shanmuga Subramanian, who helped NASA find debris from the Vikram moonlander, Indian Premier League (IPL) franchise Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) made a hilarious plea to the United States space agency only to draw social media backlash on Tuesday. (More Cricket News)
"Could the #NASA team that found #VikramLander also help us find the cricket balls hit by ABD & Virat ðÂÂÂÂÂÂÂÂÂÂÂÂÂÂÂÂÂÂ?" RCB tweeted.
But the tweet failed to impress fans. Here are some reactions:
The team had earlier posted a congratulatory tweet for the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) after the successful launch of Chandrayaan 2.
“Congratulations @isro. Watching #Chandrayan2 take off was a fantastic sight! P.S. We have a special request for you, on behalf of our batsmen,” RCB had tweeted.
NASA found the crash site and debris of India's Chandrayaan-2 Vikram moon lander following a tip from Subramanian, who examined pictures of the area of the moon taken by a US orbiting camera.
Subramanian had scoured the pictures taken by the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbital Camera (LROC), NASA and Arizona State University. The first mosaic image of the likely crash site made from pictures taken by the LROC on September 17 was downloaded by several people to look for signs of the Vikram, NASA said.
One of them, Subramanian, contacted the LROC project with positive identification of debris, it said.
Arizona State University (ASU), where the LROC project is located, said: "After receiving this tip, the LROC team confirmed the identification by comparing before and after images."
The university said that based on Subramanian's tip, the LROC team scoured the surrounding area in the new mosaics and found the impact site and the debris field.
Vikram lost contact with the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) following its launch from Chandraayan-2 moon orbiter on September 6 when it tried to make a soft-landing near the moon's south pole.
In a statement, NASA said: "Despite the loss, getting that close to the surface was an amazing achievement."
Meanwhile, IPL announced on Monday that 971 cricketers, including 713 Indians and 258 overseas players, will be up for grabs at the auction. Of those, 215 are capped and 754 uncapped players. Two cricketers from Associate Nation. They will fight for 73 spots.
RCB, which have so far failed to win the coveted trophy, will once again rely heavily on Virat Kohli and AB de Villiers to make 2020 a successful one.
