Luna 13 (E-6M series) was an

unmanned space mission A robotic spacecraft is an uncrewed spacecraft, usually under telerobotic control. A robotic spacecraft designed to make scientific research measurements is often called a space probe. Many space missions are more suited to telerobotic rather t ...

of the

Luna program The Luna programme (from the Russian word "Luna" meaning "Moon"), occasionally called ''Lunik'' by western media, was a series of robotic spacecraft missions sent to the Moon by the Soviet Union between 1959 and 1976. Fifteen were successful ...

Overview

The Luna 13 spacecraft was launched toward the Moon from an Earth-orbiting platform and accomplished a soft landing on 24 December 1966, in the region of

Oceanus Procellarum Oceanus Procellarum ( la, Ōceanus procellārum, lit=Ocean of Storms) is a vast lunar mare on the western edge of the near side of the Moon. It is the only one of the lunar maria to be called an "Oceanus" (ocean), due to its size: Oceanus Proc ...

("Ocean of Storms"). The petal encasement of the spacecraft was opened, antennas were erected, and radio transmissions to Earth began four minutes after the landing. On 25 and 26 December 1966, the spacecraft television system transmitted panoramas of the nearby lunar landscape at different Sun angles. Each panorama required approximately 100 minutes to transmit. The spacecraft was equipped with a mechanical soil-measuring

penetrometer A penetrometer is a device to test the strength of a material. Soil There are many types of penetrometer designed to be used on soil. They are usually round or cone shaped. The penetrometer is dropped on the test subject or pressed against it and t ...

, a dynamograph, and a

radiation densitometer In physics, radiation is the emission or transmission of energy in the form of waves or particles through space or through a material medium. This includes: * ''electromagnetic radiation'', such as radio waves, microwaves, infrared, visib ...

for obtaining data on the mechanical and physical properties and the

cosmic ray Cosmic rays are high-energy particles or clusters of particles (primarily represented by protons or atomic nuclei) that move through space at nearly the speed of light. They originate from the Sun, from outside of the Solar System in our own ...

reflectivity of the lunar surface. Transmissions from the spacecraft ceased on 28 December 1966. Luna 13 became the third spacecraft to land successfully on the surface of the Moon (after

Luna 9 Luna 9 (Луна-9), internal designation Ye-6 No.13, was an uncrewed space mission of the Soviet Union's Luna programme. On 3 February 1966, the Luna 9 spacecraft became the first spacecraft to achieve a survivable landing on a celestial bod ...

and the American

Surveyor 1 Surveyor 1 was the first lunar soft-lander in the uncrewed Surveyor program of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA, United States). This lunar soft-lander gathered data about the lunar surface that would be needed for the cre ...

). The probe landed in the Ocean of Storms at 18:01 UT on 24 December 1966, between the Krafft and Seleucus craters at 18°52' north latitude and 62°3' west longitude. Unlike its predecessor, the heavier Luna 13 lander (113 kilograms) carried a suite of scientific instruments in addition to the usual imaging system. A three-axis accelerometer within the pressurized frame of the lander recorded the landing forces during impact to determine the soil structure down to a depth of . A pair of spring-loaded booms were also deployed. One of these booms carried a

, designed to measure the forces required to penetrate the lunar

regolith Regolith () is a blanket of unconsolidated, loose, heterogeneous superficial deposits covering solid rock. It includes dust, broken rocks, and other related materials and is present on Earth, the Moon, Mars, some asteroids, and other terrestria ...

– the penetrating force being supplied by a minute explosive charge. The other boom carried a

backscatter In physics, backscatter (or backscattering) is the reflection of waves, particles, or signals back to the direction from which they came. It is usually a diffuse reflection due to scattering, as opposed to specular reflection as from a mirror, a ...

densitometer A densitometer is a device that measures the degree of darkness (the optical density) of a photographic or semitransparent material or of a reflecting surface. The densitometer is basically a light source aimed at a photoelectric cell. It determ ...

that was used to infer the density of the lunar near-surface regolith. Four radiometers recorded infrared radiation from the surface indicating a noon temperature of 117 ±3 °C while a radiation detector indicated that radiation levels would be less than hazardous for humans. The lander returned a total of five panoramas of the lunar surface, showing a more smooth terrain than seen by Luna 9. One of the two cameras (intended to return stereo images) failed, but this did not diminish the quality of the photographs. The penetrometer measured the regolith density at 800Kg/m³. After a fully successful mission, contact was lost at 06:13 UTC on 28 December when the on-board batteries were exhausted.

References

External links

Zarya - Luna 13 chronology

Luna-13 sends photographs of Moon (An archived news report dated 26 December 1966)
{{Orbital launches in 1966 Luna programme Spacecraft launched in 1966 1966 in the Soviet Union Spacecraft launched by Molniya-M rockets Soft landings on the Moon 1966 on the Moon

Overview

See also

References

External links