Written & Edited By : Aditi Mishra
20 August 2023 ( New Delhi) : The Russian space agency said on Sunday that Luna 25, Russia’s first moon mission in nearly 50 years, had ended in a crash landing, once again emphasizing the dangers associated with a lunar landing.
Only one nation, China, has been successful in sending a spacecraft to gently land on the moon since 1976. With Chang’e 3 and Chang’e 4, it accomplished that twice. India, Israel, Japan, and now Russia have all made attempts over the past ten years, but they have all been unsuccessful. Chandrayaan-3 entered the pre-landing orbit early on Sunday morning in India’s second attempt to land later this week.
When Luna 25 tried to enter the pre-landing orbit on Saturday in preparation for a Monday landing, it encountered difficulties. According to the Russian space agency Roscosmos, “an emergency situation” arose during the operation and prevented the move from proceeding. It afterwards lost touch with the spaceship as well.
“The efforts made on August 19 and 20 to locate Luna 25 and communicate with it were unsuccessful. According to the preliminary analysis’s findings, the autonomous station switched off to an off-design orbit and ceased to exist as a result of a collision with the lunar surface. This was because the actual impulse’s parameters deviated from the calculated ones, it stated.
The designation Luna 25 refers to the Luna series of moon missions that were launched by the Soviet Union at the time in the 1960s and 1970s. The final spacecraft to touch down on the moon, Luna 24, was launched in 1976, just before lunar operations came to an end for over two decades.
In the 1990s, moon missions resumed, and they became more frequent after 2003 as more nations joined the project. In 2007, China launched their first moon mission, followed by India in 2008. They were both successful orbiters.
