The Russian moon probe Luna-25 crashed on the moon last Saturday, as announced by the Russian space agency on Sunday. A malfunction during a thruster firing resulted in the loss of communication and the spacecraft veering off its intended orbit.
This unfortunate event followed some issues during a previous orbit adjustment. In this instance, however, contact was permanently lost and flight controllers were unable to regain communications. News of the spacecraft’s failure was conveyed by Roscosmos, the Russian federal space agency, through the social media platform Telegram.
According to a Russian post translated by Google: “An unexpected deviation of the actual rocket firing parameters from the calculated ones resulted in the spacecraft shifting to an incorrect orbit and eventually crashing into the lunar surface, leading to the end of its existence.”
A Reuters report says Russia last ventured on a moon mission back in 1976 with Luna-24, during Leonid Brezhnev’s reign over the Kremlin. The mission of Luna-25 aimed to conduct a gentle landing on the moon’s south pole on Aug. 21, as communicated by officials from the Russian space department.
The failure further emphasizes the stress on Russia’s concrete $2 trillion economy enduring the harshest sanctions ever inflicted, according to Western perspectives.
Western countries argue that these sanctions have handicapped Russia’s economy, especially the segments dealing with advanced technology that often depend on imports. Regardless, President Vladimir Putin stresses that the Russian economy is exhibiting extraordinary resilience.
For the last thirty years, Russia has elaborated different lunar projects, yet their implementation was often disrupted by the political and economic instability that followed the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union.
The 2011 Fobos-Grunt mission to one of Mars’ moons underscored the significant struggles Russia’s space initiative faced. It was unable to break free from earth’s orbit, ultimately falling back to earth and crashing into the Pacific Ocean in 2012.
Finally, in the early 2010s, Russia decided to undertake the Luna-25 mission targeting the moon’s south pole.
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