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April 15, 2022
During a visit to Belarus, Vladimir Putin explained Russia's wishes regarding space exploration. The Russian president announced a return to the Moon in 2022 with the Luna 25 robotic mission, from which the ESA withdrew a few days ago.
Image above: An artist's depiction of a lunar lander in Russia's second-generation Luna program. Image credit: Roscosmos.
Space exploration is taking on the appearance of the Cold War. On April 12, Vladimir Putin made his first outing from Moscow since the start of the war in Ukraine, on February 24, 2022. He was visiting his Belarusian counterpart, Alexander Lukashenko, the two heads of state making a televised intervention since the Vostotchny cosmodrome, in the east of Russia.
On this highly symbolic date, marking the 61st anniversary of the first manned space flight by Yuri Gagarin, Vladimir Putin wanted to recall the importance of Russia in the field of space conquest and announced the return of lunar missions from 2022. The agency space Roscosmos should coordinate the Luna 25 mission, a robotic scientific mission to study the Moon. It will be the first Russian probe to land on our natural satellite since 1976 and the Luna 24 mission.
Image above: Landing of the Luna 25 probe which would mark the return of Russia to the Moon. Image Credit: Roscosmos.
Back to the future
Russian news agency RIA Novosti revealed on April 8 that Roscosmos plans to launch the Luna 25 probe on August 22, 2022. If the mission has already experienced delays, Vladimir Putin reportedly asked the space agency's director general, Dmitry Rogozin , that the probe will be ready before September according to the Tass news agency. Luna 25 could effectively mean a return of Russia to the aerospace field, the sector having suffered a deep economic crisis induced by the collapse of the Soviet bloc in 1991.
The first sketches for Luna 25 emerged in 1997. The project, then called "Luna Glob", was formalized in 2005 and the probe was to take off for the Moon in 2012. But as the delays followed, the failure of the mission Martian Fobos-Grunt leads to a postponement of Luna 25 to 2016. Luna 25 will be launched from the Vostotchny cosmodrome with a Soyuz 2.1b and will land near the South Pole after five days of travel.
Image above: The Soyuz 2.1b rocket will send the Luna 25 probe to the Moon. Image Credits: Roscosmos, A. Morgunov.
Once on the Moon, Luna 25 will engage in various experiments on the lunar soil. The main objectives relate to the analysis of the regolith, covering the entire surface of the Moon with a layer of white dust. The probe will also be able to observe the thermal variations of the regolith in the region, which could provide clues to researchers on the potential presence of water in the inner layers of the Moon.
Russia goes it alone
The Luna 25 mission was to take place in collaboration with the European Space Agency (ESA), but the war triggered by Russia got the better of scientific collaborations between this country and Western space institutions. On April 13, the ESA declared it was withdrawing from Luna missions 25, 26 and 27. A new setback, while the ExoMars mission also suffered the wrath of geopolitical tensions with Russia and will surely not leave in 2022.
Image above: From 2026, China should begin the construction of a permanent lunar base, in collaboration with Russia. Image Credit: Chinese National Space Administration (CNSA).
It is difficult to predict whether Roscosmos will meet its deadlines and succeed in launching Luna 25 in August. Most specialists agree that landing on the Moon is a perilous task. But the Luna 25 mission is of major importance for Russia, and could be a first milestone for cooperation with China on the construction of the permanent lunar base, the International Lunar Research Station (ILRS), which should start in 2026.
ROSCOSMOS: http://www.roscosmos.ru/
Images (mentioned), Text, Credits: ROSCOSMOS/Orbiter.ch Aerospace/Roland Berga.
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