Russia Plans Lunar Mission In 2012, Eyes US Lunar Return Partnership

MOON DAILY

The mother ship will deliver a polar station, equipped with a mass spectrometer and neutron spectrometer, to the surface. The objective of the station is to detect water ice deposits in the polar zones of the Moon. The device, developed by Russian scientists, will first be tested through NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter project, to be launched in 2008.

by Staff Writers
Moscow, Russia (RIA Novosti) Dec 08, 2006
Russia will launch its first major mission to the Moon, Luna-Glob, in 2012 after a 30-year break from lunar exploration, a space agency spokesman said Thursday.

Russia, a pioneer in robotic lunar research, abandoned its lunar exploration program with the end of the Moon race in the mid-1970s, but the idea of exploring the Earth's natural satellite has been revisited recently, due to ambitious international projects to develop the Moon's resources and to use it as a stepping-stone for further space exploration.

Igor Panarin, press secretary of Roskosmos, said the unmanned flight will include a lunar orbiter that will fire 12 penetrators across diverse regions of the Moon to create a seismic network, which will be used to study the Moon's origin.

After firing the penetrators, the mother ship will deliver a polar station, equipped with a mass spectrometer and neutron spectrometer, to the surface.

The objective of the station is to detect water ice deposits in the polar zones of the Moon. The device, developed by Russian scientists, will first be tested through NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter project, to be launched in 2008.

Russia is also planning five minor unmanned launches to the Moon between 2008 and 2015.

In the 1950s-1970s, the Soviet Union carried out 60 robotic lunar missions, of which about 20 were partially or fully successful.

Russia Ready To Join US Moon Exploration Programme

Russia is prepared to take part in the United States' Moon exploration programme "on an equal footing", Russian space agency Roskosmos said on Thursday. "The invitation from the American Space Agency (NASA) was sent to Roskosmos and we are examining it," spokesman Igor Panarin told Moscow Echo radio.

He said he hoped the United States and Russia could "work out ways to participate that are acceptable to everyone".

NASA announced on Monday that it planned to send astronauts to the Moon in 2020 to set up a small permanent base at its south pole, the first stage in an ambitious human exploration of the solar system.

The Moon base, a project NASA unveiled after consulting 13 other space agencies and several private companies, could in time serve as a staging post for astronauts on their way to Mars.

Panarin said Russia planned to send five small spacecraft to the Moon from 2007 and launch another craft, called Luna Globe, in 2012.

Moscow, which put the first human in space on April 12, 1961, would like to regain its status as a super-power in space and challenge Washington's dominance of the field.

Source: Agence France-Presse

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Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter Successfully Completes Critical Design Review

Greenbelt MD (SPX) Dec 08, 2006
The Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) successfully completed its Critical Design Review (CDR) on Thursday, November 9, 2006. The review was held to present the complete system design developed at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, and to make sure that technical issues have been properly addressed. Additionally, it ensured that the design maturity justifies the start of manufacturing mission hardware and software.

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