Russia’s Luna-25 spacecraft has crashed into the Moon after spinning into an uncontrolled orbit, officials say.

The unmanned craft was due to make a soft landing on the Moon’s south pole, but failed after encountering issues as it moved into its pre-landing orbit.

It was Russia’s first Moon mission in almost 50 years.

The spacecraft was scheduled to land on Monday to explore a part of the Moon which scientists think could hold frozen water and precious elements.

Roskosmos, Russia’s state space corporation, said it lost contact with the Luna-25 shortly after running into difficulties.

  • @[email protected]
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    1 year ago

    It’s not false, but from Russia it’s worthless. China and India have actually competent missions to the same region planned, and the US’s Artemis 3 crewed mission is also planning to land in that region by 2026. This was absolutely an incompetent rush job attempt to beat everybody else to the punch in the name of “Russian Superiority”.

    • @Anomalous_Llama
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      11 year ago

      They also had announced that they wouldn’t be sharing any of the scientific data gathered