An ambitious but failed attempt by Russia to return to the moon after nearly half a century has exposed the massive challenges faced by Moscow’s once-proud space program.
The destruction of the robotic Luna-25 probe, which crashed onto the surface of the moon over the weekend, reflects the endemic problems that have dogged the Russian space industry since the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union. Those include the loss of key technologies in the post-Soviet industrial meltdown, the bruising impact of recent Western sanctions, a huge brain drain, and widespread corruption.
Yuri Borisov, the head of the state-controlled space corporation Roscosmos, attributed the failure to the lack…
Keep on reading: Failed lunar mission dents Russian pride, reflects deeper problems with Moscow’s space industry
