The Luna-25 probe, Russia's first Moon mission in almost 50 years, has crashed on the Earth's natural satellite after an unspecified incident during pre-landing manoeuvres, the Russian space agency Roscosmos said Sunday.
The crash comes almost a year and a half into Russia's Ukraine offensive that has seen Moscow isolated, with punishing sanctions that have affected its space industry.
With Luna-25, Moscow had hoped to build on the legacy of its Soviet-era Luna programme, marking a return to independent Moon exploration in the face of financial troubles and corruption scandals at the programme and growing isolation from the West. The Luna-25 launch was postponed several times in the last five years, Yegorov said,"because of sanctions imposed on Russia in response to seizing Crimea"."Science, fundamental research, some kind of humanistic ideas about space colonisation, about revealing the secrets of the universe, are clearly not a priority right now," said Yegorov, who has denounced the Kremlin's Ukraine offensive.
Luna-25 had been successfully placed in the Moon's orbit on Wednesday after being launched from the Vostochny cosmodrome in the Russian Far East.But on Saturday, Roscosmos said an"emergency" had been detected during a manoeuvre by the probe before its landing, preventing the operation from being carried out.
United States Latest News, United States Headlines
Similar News:You can also read news stories similar to this one that we have collected from other news sources.
Luna-25: Russia’s first moon landing in 47 years ends in a crashLuna-25 was a part of Russia’s ambitious plan to revive its lunar exploration program and demonstrate its technological prowess in space.
Read more »
Luna-25 probe crashes: Russia's first Moon mission in almost 50 years failsAccording to preliminary findings by Roscosmos, the Luna-25 probe 'has ceased to exist following a collision with the Moon's surface', after being successfully placed in its orbit earlier this week.
Read more »
As Russian and Indian lunar landings near, the moon rush gets crowdedSpacecraft from the two countries are set to touch down on the lunar surface over the next few days.
Read more »
Russian spacecraft suffers ‘abnormal situation' on way to moon's south poleRussia reported an “abnormal situation” Saturday on its moon-bound Luna-25 spacecraft, which launched earlier this month.
Read more »
The Russian space agency says its Luna-25 spacecraft has crashed into the moonRussia's unmanned robot lander crashed after it had spun into uncontrolled orbit, the country's space agency Roscosmos reported.
Read more »