Soviet Luna Missions Options

[PhilHorzempa]

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I thought that it was time to start up a discussion of what we know, or
would like to know, about the Soviet Luna Missions.

To start off, I have heard many a reference to the landing system utilized
by the early landers, such as Luna 9. However, I have yet to find a report,
or even a diagram, that shows the sequence of events, or such details as
the air bags. If such references do not exist, I hope that some of the UMSF
community have Russian contacts that could lead us to the source material
before it ends up in the dust bin of history.

In addition, I heard of an effort several years ago to obtain ALL of the imagery
from Lunakhods 1 and 2. Does anyone know if that effort was able to
secure that data?

Also, as far as Lunas 15, 18 and 23, the sample-return missions that didn't
quite make it home, are there any official reports "out there" that detail what
actually occurred to those missions? Or will we have to wait for the
high-resolution images from the LRO to determine their fates?


Another Phil

[Phil Stooke]

Following up on a couple of points here... I'm on vacation and away from my usual resources...

The Russians are trying to collect everything and make it available through a website, similar to a PDS node. But they have no money for it. I have been close to the people involved, chiefly Kira B. Shingareva of MIIGAiK and Sasha Basilevsky of Vernadsky. Some material has been collected - big tapes with Lunokhod images from the State Archives, stuff stolen for later sale and now recovered, negatives scanned etc. But getting it all organized is another matter and the lack of money makes it very slow. Some has been done on a volunteer basis. So don't expect results for a long time. What we REALLY need is a philanthropist to put money into it. So email all your philanthropist buddies.

Lunas 15, 16, 18 and 20 plus the failed sample return launches from that period - all had cameras. Don Mitchell describes them on his site, referenced above. Luna 16, it appears now, DID take images. It landed at night and its lights failed, as noted above, but it took pics anyway. But they were mostly black with just a few spots of light from earthshine. They were never published. (This info from Basilevsky via Mitchell). I would dearly love to get my hands on the digital data, and I assume we could do a lot more with it using modern methods than was possible back in 1970. The later sample return missions had no cameras due to having a redesigned drill. The old camera was for targeting the old drill to a rock-free spot. The new drill couldn't be retargeted and also took up the camera's space and mass (I think).

Phil