In a disappointing turn of events, Roscosmos revealed on Sunday afternoon that Luna-25 had crash-landed on the Moon’s surface. Meanwhile, Chandrayaan-3 is gearing up for its descent, scheduled for around 6.04 pm IST on Wednesday.
Russia’s Luna-25 experienced a crash on the surface of the Moon, as announced by the country’s space agency on Sunday. This unfortunate incident has now positioned India’s Chandrayaan-3 to potentially become the pioneer spacecraft to accomplish a landing near the lunar south pole.
On Sunday morning, Chandrayaan-3 entered its pre-landing orbit at 25 km x 134 km above the lunar surface, all set for its planned landing on the upcoming Wednesday. The spacecraft is poised to initiate its descent from this orbit at around 5.45 pm IST on the designated day. The touchdown is anticipated approximately 15 minutes after that.
Initially set for a soft lunar landing on Monday, August 21, two days ahead of Chandrayaan-3, Luna-25 faced difficulties on Saturday while attempting to transition into the pre-landing orbit.
The Russian space agency, Roscosmos, reported on Saturday that an “emergency situation” had arisen on the spacecraft, preventing the successful completion of the orbit-reduction maneuver. Communication with the spacecraft was also lost. Roscosmos mentioned its efforts to resolve the issue.
Unfortunately, on Sunday afternoon, Roscosmos officially confirmed that Luna-25 had crash-landed on the Moon’s surface, culminating in a disappointing outcome for the mission. The agency stated that the measures taken to locate Luna-25 and reestablish communication proved unsuccessful.
According to preliminary analysis, Roscosmos revealed that due to a deviation in impulse parameters from the calculated values, the automatic station deviated from its intended orbit and ultimately collided with the lunar surface.
Luna-25 marked modern Russia’s inaugural lunar mission. The last lunar mission by the former Soviet Union dated back to 1976, with Luna-24 achieving a successful landing. China’s Chang’e-3 achieved a lunar landing in 2013, marking the end of a 37-year gap since Luna-24.
In recent years, India, Israel, Japan, and now Russia have all attempted lunar soft landings, facing challenges in the final stages leading to crash-landings. Chandrayaan-3 holds the prospect of potentially rectifying this trend for India. Simultaneously, Japan is gearing up for another attempt with its SLIM spacecraft scheduled for launch later this month.