''Luna 20'' was the second of three successful

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, ...

lunar

sample return mission A sample-return mission is a spacecraft mission to collect and return samples from an extraterrestrial location to Earth for analysis. Sample-return missions may bring back merely atoms and molecules or a deposit of complex compounds such as lo ...

s. It was flown as part 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 ...

as a robotic competitor to the six successful

Apollo Apollo, grc, Ἀπόλλωνος, Apóllōnos, label=genitive , ; , grc-dor, Ἀπέλλων, Apéllōn, ; grc, Ἀπείλων, Apeílōn, label=Arcadocypriot Greek, ; grc-aeo, Ἄπλουν, Áploun, la, Apollō, la, Apollinis, label= ...

lunar sample return missions.

Overview

''Luna 20'' was placed in an intermediate Earth

parking orbit A parking orbit is a temporary orbit used during the launch of a spacecraft. A launch vehicle boosts into the parking orbit, then coasts for a while, then fires again to enter the final desired trajectory. The alternative to a parking orbit is ''di ...

and from this orbit was sent towards 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 entered lunar orbit on 18 February 1972. On 21 February 1972, ''Luna 20'' soft landed on the

in a mountainous area known as the Terra Apollonius (or Apollonius highlands) near

Mare Fecunditatis Mare Fecunditatis (Latin ''fēcunditātis'', the "Sea of Fecundity" or "Sea of Fertility") is a lunar mare in the eastern half of the visible Moon. The mare has a maximum diameter of 840 km. __NOTOC__ Description The Fecunditatis basin form ...

(Sea of Fertility), 120 km from where ''

Luna 16 ''Luna 16'' was an uncrewed space mission, part of the Soviet Luna program. It was the first robotic probe to land on the Moon and return a sample of lunar soil to Earth. The 101 grams (3.56 ounces) sample was returned from Mare Fecunditatis. ...

'' had landed. While on the lunar surface, the panoramic television system was operated.

Lunar sample Moon rock or lunar rock is rock originating from Earth's Moon. This includes lunar material collected during the course of human exploration of the Moon, and rock that has been ejected naturally from the Moon's surface and landed on Earth as ...

s were obtained by means of an extendable drilling apparatus. The ascent stage of ''Luna 20'' was launched from the lunar surface on 22 February 1972 carrying 1.9 ounces (55 grams) of collected lunar samples in a sealed capsule. It landed in the

Soviet Union The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen national ...

on 25 February 1972. The lunar samples were recovered the following day. This was the eighth Soviet spacecraft launched with the intent of returning lunar soil to Earth. It was evidently sent to complete the mission that

Luna 18 ''Luna 18'', part of the Ye-8-5 series, was an unmanned space mission of the Luna program. Overview ''Luna 18'' was placed in an Earth parking orbit after it was launched and was then sent towards the Moon. On 7 September 1971, it entered lunar ...

had failed to accomplish. After a 4.5-day flight to the Moon, which included a single midcourse correction on 15 February, ''Luna 20'' entered orbit around the Moon on 18 February. Initial orbital parameters were 100 x 100 kilometers at 65°

inclination Orbital inclination measures the tilt of an object's orbit around a celestial body. It is expressed as the angle between a Plane of reference, reference plane and the orbital plane or Axis of rotation, axis of direction of the orbiting object ...

. Three days later, at 19:13 UT, the spacecraft fired its main engine for 267 seconds to begin descent to the lunar surface. A second firing further reduced velocity before Luna 20 set down safely on the Moon at 19:19 UT on 21 February 1972 at coordinates 3.7863 North and 56.6242 East, only 1.8 kilometers from the crash site of Luna 18. After collecting a small sample of lunar soil, the spacecraft's ascent stage lifted off at 22:58 UT on 22 February and quickly accelerated to 2.7 kilometers per second velocity—sufficient to return to Earth. The small spherical capsule eventually parachuted down safely on an island in the Karkingir River, 40 kilometers north of the town of

Jezkazgan Jezkazgan, or Zhezkazgan ( kk, Жезқазған, translit=Jezqazğan ), formerly known as Dzhezkazgan (russian: Джезказган) until 1992, is a city and the administrative centre of Ulytau Region, Kazakhstan, on a reservoir of the Kara ...

Kazakhstan Kazakhstan, officially the Republic of Kazakhstan, is a transcontinental country located mainly in Central Asia and partly in Eastern Europe. It borders Russia to the north and west, China to the east, Kyrgyzstan to the southeast, Uzbeki ...

, at 19:19 UT on 25 February 1972. The 55-gram soil sample differed from that collected by ''Luna 16'' in that the majority (50 to 60%) of the rock particles in the newer sample were ancient lunar highlands

anorthosite Anorthosite () is a phaneritic, intrusive igneous rock characterized by its composition: mostly plagioclase feldspar (90–100%), with a minimal mafic component (0–10%). Pyroxene, ilmenite, magnetite, and olivine are the mafic minerals most ...

(which consists largely of

feldspar Feldspars are a group of rock-forming aluminium tectosilicate minerals, also containing other cations such as sodium, calcium, potassium, or barium. The most common members of the feldspar group are the ''plagioclase'' (sodium-calcium) feldsp ...

) rather than the

basalt Basalt (; ) is an aphanite, aphanitic (fine-grained) extrusive igneous rock formed from the rapid cooling of low-viscosity lava rich in magnesium and iron (mafic lava) exposed at or very near the planetary surface, surface of a terrestrial ...

of the earlier one (which contained about 1 to 2% of anorthosite). The American

Apollo 16 Apollo 16 (April 1627, 1972) was the tenth crewed mission in the United States Apollo space program, administered by NASA, and the fifth and penultimate to land on the Moon. It was the second of Apollo's " J missions", with an extended sta ...

mission returned similar highlands material two months later. Like the ''Luna 16'' soil, samples of the ''Luna 20'' collection were shared with American and French scientists. A 0.4983g sample of material from a depth of 27and 32 cm was sent to Britain. In March 2010, NASA reported that its

Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter The Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) is a NASA robotic spacecraft currently orbiting the Moon in an eccentric polar mapping orbit. Data collected by LRO have been described as essential for planning NASA's future human and robotic missions t ...

satellite had spotted ''Luna 20'' on the lunar surface.

References

External links

Zarya - Luna program chronology

NASA NSSDC Master Catalog
{{Orbital launches in 1972 Luna programme Sample return missions Missions to the Moon Soft landings on the Moon 1972 in the Soviet Union Spacecraft launched in 1972 1972 on the Moon

Overview

See also

References

External links