IRIA News

Russia’s space agency launched a moon mission on August 11, 2023, for the first time in nearly 50 years. The mission is designed to bring a lunar probe, Luna-25, to the moon. The probe would conduct experiments and collect samples for one year before heading back to Earth.

The launch of Luna-25 is Russia’s first lunar launch since 1976, which was the peak of the USSR’s space exploration. A Russian-made Soyuz rocket carrying the lunar probe took off at around 2 AM from the Vostochny Cosmodrome in Russia’s Far East. The Russian space agency, Roscosmos, released live images of the launch. 

To accommodate a smooth launch, the Russian administration evacuated an entire village in the Shakhtinskyi area. Some reports indicated that the village lies in the region where the Soyuz rocket’s boosters may land after they separate from the spacecraft.

Luna-25 is expected to land on the moon’s south pole on August 21, becoming the first space mission to land on the moon’s southern pole and beating India’s Chandrayaan-3 by a thin margin.

“For the first time in history, the lunar landing will take place on the lunar south pole. Until now, everyone has been landing in the equatorial zone,” senior Roscosmos official Alexander Blokhin said in a recent interview.

Russia’s space agency has been working on the Luna-25 for the past few years and originally planned to launch the probe in October 2021. The mission faced several delays due to several issues, largely related to Moscow’s political isolation following its invasion of Ukraine.

The mission was also supposed to carry a navigation camera called Pilot-D supplied by the European Space Agency but that project was canceled after Russia invaded Ukraine last year.

Race to the far side of the moon

The rough terrain on the moon’s south pole makes it difficult for spacecraft to land, however, the prize of landing on the far side of the moon could be an opportunity of exploring a huge untouched area that may hold significant quantities of ice and other unexplored material. These materials could be used to extract fuel and oxygen, as well as fresh drinking water.

Several space agencies around the world have been working on developing lunar crafts that are able to land on the far side of the moon and explore the area, with India, Russia, and Japan being the frontrunners.

Last month, India launched its Chandrayaan-3 space mission that would touch down on the moon on August 23, two days after the Russian probe makes a landing. Roscosmos said the two missions would not get in each other’s way because they have different trajectories and separate landing areas.

India’s Chandrayaan-3 is set to conduct its experiments for two weeks, while Russia’s Luna-25 is would stay on the moon for one year. Due to its larger size and capacity to carry 31 kilograms of scientific equipment, Luna-25 would be able to bring larger samples of lunar rocks from a depth of up to 6 inches. These samples could play a pivotal role in testing the possibility of the presence of frozen water on the moon that could support human life.

“The moon is the seventh continent of the Earth so we are simply ‘condemned’, as it were, to tame it,” said Lev Zeleny, a space researcher at the Russian Academy of Sciences.

Russia making independent space exploration efforts

Russian President Vladimir Putin has pledged to pace up his country’s space capabilities despite the ongoing sanctions. Russia has been pushing to make its space exploration more and more independent for the last few years.

Last year, Moscow also announced its plans to quit the International Space Station (ISS) by 2024 and focus on building its own orbiting outpost in space. Russia is planning to allocate more resources toward building its own space station named Russian Orbital Service Station (ROSS).

The decision to create Russia’s own orbital outpost was finalized in 2021. In May 2022 Russia’s space agency Roscosmos signed a contract with Russia’s Energia Space Rocket Corporation for making the first basic module for the station.