NASA thinks it has found the crater formed on the Moon by the impact of the Russian Luna-25 probe

The Russian aircraft hit the lunar ground on August 19 after an incident that occurred during a maneuver to be carried out before its moon landing.

NASA released an image of a new crater on the Moon on Thursday evening, most likely formed by the impact of the Russian Luna-25 probe, which crashed into the lunar surface about two weeks ago.

The photograph was taken by the LRO (Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter) probe, which has been orbiting the Earth’s natural satellite since 2009.

Teams from the American space agency compared images taken before and after the moment of impact, and observed “a new small crater”, explains a press release. This “is about 10 meters in diameter,” NASA said, and is “about 400 km from the planned landing site for Luna-25.”

Failure for the Russian lunar mission

The American space agency specified that it had sent commands to the LRO probe so that it would observe the area communicated by the Russian space agency Roscosmos as the estimated location of the crash.

Since the crater is “close to the estimated impact point of Luna-25”, the NASA teams “conclude that it is likely that it resulted from this mission, and not from a natural projectile”.

Nearly fifty years after Moscow’s last successful lunar mission, the Luna-25 probe, weighing almost 800 kilos, hit the lunar ground on August 19 following an incident that occurred during a maneuver prior to its moon landing .

Only days later, India became the first nation to land a spacecraft near the Moon’s south pole, an unexplored area that is now the focus of attention because there is water in the form of ice.