Luna E-1 No.1
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Luna E-1 No.1, sometimes identified by NASA as Luna 1958A, was a
Soviet The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, ...
Luna E-1 spacecraft which was intended to impact the
Moon The Moon is Earth's only natural satellite. It is the fifth largest satellite in the Solar System and the largest and most massive relative to its parent planet, with a diameter about one-quarter that of Earth (comparable to the width of ...
. It did not accomplish this objective as it was lost in a launch failure. It was the first of four E-1 missions to be launched. Luna E-1 No.1 was a spacecraft which marked the first Soviet attempt to send a spacecraft to the Moon. It was also the first mission of the
Luna programme 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, ...
. The spacecraft was intended to release of
sodium Sodium is a chemical element with the symbol Na (from Latin ''natrium'') and atomic number 11. It is a soft, silvery-white, highly reactive metal. Sodium is an alkali metal, being in group 1 of the periodic table. Its only stable iso ...
, in order to create a "comet" of the metal which could be observed from Earth, allowing the spacecraft to be tracked. Prior to the release of information about its mission, NASA correctly identified that it had been an attempted lunar impact mission. Chief Designer
Sergei Korolev Sergei Pavlovich Korolev (russian: Сергей Павлович Королёв, Sergey Pavlovich Korolyov, sʲɪrˈɡʲej ˈpavləvʲɪtɕ kərɐˈlʲɵf, Ru-Sergei Pavlovich Korolev.ogg; ukr, Сергій Павлович Корольов, ...
's ambitious space plans were being continually frustrated by design changes to the R-7 missile, launch failures, and the fact that the
ICBM An intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) is a ballistic missile with a range greater than , primarily designed for nuclear weapons delivery (delivering one or more thermonuclear warheads). Conventional, chemical, and biological weapons c ...
program took priority. On 10 July 1958, a test version of the Luna booster was flown which had a dummy upper stage (live avionics, but no engine) in order to try out the modifications to the R-7, which included a stronger airframe to support the added weight of the upper stage and more powerful engines (these engines had first been tested on Sputnik 3's booster a few months earlier). At liftoff, the Blok D strap-on suffered an engine malfunction and broke off of the booster, impacting on the pad and exploding. The rest of the R-7 crashed a few hundred feet away. This accident, which caused considerable damage to Site 1/5, was traced to high-frequency vibrations in the combustion chamber of Blok D, something that would become a persistent problem on R-7 launches over the next two years. Since the first Luna probe was scheduled for launch in a month, repairs on the pad were done at breakneck speed. As Korolev knew that the United States was planning to launch a lunar probe on 17 August 1958, he faced considerable pressure getting the Luna and its booster ready for launch. Despite a number of technical issues, the pad crews managed to get the booster ready on the 17 August 1958, but Korolev instead decided to let the US flight go first on the reasoning that the Luna probe had a shorter trajectory to travel and would reach the Moon first. After that launch ended in a booster explosion, he decided to postpone the flight until the glitches with the 8K72 and Luna could be worked out. Luna E-1 No.1 was launched on 23 September 1958 at 07:40:23 GMT atop a
Luna Luna commonly refers to: * Earth's Moon, named "Luna" in Latin * Luna (goddess), the ancient Roman personification of the Moon Luna may also refer to: Places Philippines * Luna, Apayao * Luna, Isabela * Luna, La Union * Luna, San Jose Romania * ...
8K72
carrier rocket A launch vehicle or carrier rocket is a rocket designed to carry a payload (spacecraft or satellites) from the Earth's surface to outer space. Most launch vehicles operate from a launch pad, launch pads, supported by a missile launch contro ...
, flying from Site 1/5 at the
Baikonur Cosmodrome The Baikonur Cosmodrome ( kk, Байқоңыр ғарыш айлағы, translit=Baiqoñyr ğaryş ailağy, ; russian: Космодром Байконур, translit=Kosmodrom Baykonur, ) is a spaceport in an area of southern Kazakhstan leased to R ...
. Ninety-two seconds after launch,
longitudinal resonance A longitudinal mode of a resonant cavity is a particular standing wave pattern formed by waves confined in the cavity. The longitudinal modes correspond to the wavelengths of the wave which are reinforced by constructive interference after ma ...
within the rocket's strap-on booster rockets caused the vehicle to disintegrate.


References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Luna E-1 No.1 Luna programme Spacecraft launched in 1958