August 20, 2023 – 12:39 PM
The Luna-25 automatic station on the moon crashed and was destroyed, MTI quoted Russia’s Roscosmos.
According to Roskosmos, it is planned to send a pulse on Saturday to form the elliptical orbit of the structure before landing. However, communication with Luna-25 was reportedly lost around 2:57 PM Moscow time.
Efforts to locate the structure and record communications with it over the past two days were unsuccessful.
“According to the results of the preliminary analysis, due to the deviation of the pulse parameters, the Luna-25 spacecraft did not enter the calculated orbit, collided with the lunar surface and was destroyed,” the Russian company said.
The reasons for the loss of Luna-25 will be investigated by a special interministerial committee set up for this purpose.
This project was the first mission of the Russian lunar exploration program. The previous station, named Luna-24, was launched from the Soviet Union in 1976.
Luna-25 was launched from the Vostochny station, and was planned to be the first spacecraft to land on the difficult terrain of the lunar south pole. The main task of the station was to analyze the composition of the soil and determine whether there is water ice on the celestial body.
