The Russian Space Agency Roscosmos reported early Wednesday that the Luna-25 lander had successfully entered the Moon’s orbit.
“All Luna-25 systems are functioning normally; communication with it is stable. Sessions are being taken to measure the current navigational parameters,” Roscosmos said in a Telegram post today.
The Luna-25 lander is set to orbit 100Km above the Moon’s surface before a planned landing on Monday north of the Boguslawsky crater on the lunar south pole.
Luna-25 lander weighing around 800 kilograms is Russia’s first launch since 1976. The Russian Federation said it hopes to provide renewed momentum to its space industry.
According to Roscomos cameras installed on the Luna-25 lander have already taken distant shots of the Earth and Moon from space.
The lander was blasted into space by a Soyuz rocket launched Friday from the Vostochny cosmodrome in Russia’s Far East.
It is due to stay on the Moon for a year, where it is tasked with collecting samples and analyzing soil.
Russia said it would go ahead with its own lunar explorer plans, despite the European Space Agency (ESA) announcing it would not cooperate with Moscow on future missions over its invasion.
Meanwhile, Russia’s space agency also hopes to launch its own orbital station in 2025.
Luna-25 isn’t the only spacecraft gearing up for a lunar landing: India’s Chandrayaan 3 probe is doing so as well.
Chandrayaan 3 launched on July 14, entered lunar orbit on Aug. 7 and plans to land near the moon’s south pole on Aug. 23 or Aug. 24 — roughly the same time as Luna-25, and in the same general area.
The south pole is set to receive human visitors in the not-too-distant future as well. NASA aims to land people there on the Artemis 3 mission, which is targeted to launch in late 2025 or 2026.
This surge of interest is strongly tied to the south pole’s presumed stores of water ice, which NASA and exploration advocates think could support human outposts and supply propellant for spacecraft headed to Mars and other distant destinations.
