Russia’s Moon mission Luna-25 crashes on lunar surface: Russian space agency
text_fields
Moscow: Russia’s first mission to Moon in nearly 50 years, Luna-25, has crashed to the lunar surface, news agency AFP reported.
Russian Space agency Roscosmos said on Sunday that the crashing took place during pre-landing manoeuvres.
Roscosmos announced that communication with Luna was lost at 2.57 pm on Saturday.
The lander, the space agency said, ‘ceased to exist following a collision with the Moon's surface.’
It further said that measures that had been taken on August 19, and 20 to reconnect with the lander were not successful.
Without pointing at any technical problems, the space agency said it would probe the causes of the lander’s crash.
Moscow was hoping to make a robust return to its grand lunar exploration programme with the Luna 25, when it failed.
Luna-25 mission comes at a time when Russian has been isolated following its invasion of Ukraine.
The Russian mission followed the launch of India’s Chandrayaan-3 which is expected to soft land on the Moon on Wednesday.
The 800-kilogram Luna-25 was to land on the south pole of the Moon to become the first in history ahead of India’s mission arriving at the same region.
Russia has not attempted any planet exploratory mission after Soviet Union’s Phobos 2, meant for the moons of Mars, failed following malfunction of computer onboard in 1989, according to the report.
