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

[Guest_DonPMitchell_*]

My guess is they were not published, but film recordings were made and are in someone's drawer at RNII KP, scratched up and gathering dust.

[karolp]

Hi,

I recently encountered a Polish space encyclopedia titled "Copernicus, Astronomy, Astronautics" which contained a colour picture of Earth above Moon's horizon from Zond spacecraft, similar to the one recently reprocessed here. But what really caught my attention was information on Luna 15 spacecraft, which coincided with Apollo 11 landing on the Moon:

Luna 15 in Wiki

It states apolune of Luna 15 was 110 km, similar to that of the orbital module of Apollo 11 - so was there any collision hazard issue there? I was also wondering, could it actually be sighted by astronauts on the ground? And if not, did any other astronauts during other Apollo missions actually observe artifical satellites circling the Moon at that time?

Regards,

Karol P.

Edit:

The Polish Wikipedia entry:

Lunokhod in Polish Wiki

states that a launcher carrying a Lunokhod even before Lunokhod 1, designated Lunokhod 201, crashed soon after lift off on Februray 19, 1969 indicating an abvious attempt by the Soviets to place a rover on the Moon before the American manned mission. So was it really a theme of interference with Apollo and stealing the publicity even though their manned Lunar program collapsed?