The Kremlin vowed on Tuesday not to give up the race to the moon despite the recent failure of its last mission, which is no reason for “despair”.
• Also read: Russia: Putin does not plan to attend Prigozhin’s funeral
• Also read: Ukraine: In Moscow, we are preparing for drone attacks
• Also read: Russia says it has intercepted two US drones near Crimea
“We know that to get to the stars you have to take difficult paths,” spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters. “The most important thing is to continue the unique Russian space program,” which includes a lunar component, he stressed.
“The projects are very ambitious and are being implemented,” assured Mr. Peskow, emphasizing that the failure of the Luna 25 mission, the first to the moon since 1976, “is no reason to despair”.
Almost fifty years after Moscow’s last successful lunar mission, the nearly 800-kilogram Luna-25 probe crashed to the lunar surface on August 19 after an incident during a run-up maneuver.
Director of the Russian Space Agency (Roscosmos), Yuri Borisov, implored Russian President Vladimir Putin to continue the lunar exploration program despite this failure, while the Russian space sector is in trouble.
In recent years, a new race for the moon has begun. In addition to the USA, China and South Korea are also showing their ambitions.
India, which became the first country to land a spacecraft near the moon’s south pole, an unexplored area, immediately after the Russian failure, will launch a satellite on September 2 to study the sun.