September 14, 1959 – The First Man-Made Object to Reach the Moon

On this day in engineering history, the now defunct Soviet Union (U.S.S.R.) scored an important victory in the Space Race when its Luna 2 spacecraft crashed into the Moon. It was the first time a man-made object had reached the moon's surface, and further validated the existence of solar winds. Although American astronauts would walk on the Moon just ten years later, the United States had lost another contest to its Cold War rival.

The Soviet Union's Luna Spacecraft

Also known as mechta (meaning"dream" in Russian), Luna 2 was the follow-up spacecraft to the semi-successful Luna 1. In January of 1959, Luna 1 had provided new information about Earth's radiation belt, the lack of a magnetic field on the Moon, and the existence of solar winds (or ionized plasma). When a malfunction in the ground-based control of Luna 1's rockets caused an incorrect burn time, however, the errant spacecraft passed by the Moon at a distance of 5,900 km instead of reaching the lunar surface. Nine months later, the Soviets tried again with the slightly modified Luna 2.

If It Ain't Broke…

That Luna 2 involved more of a tweaking than a complete redesign explains the close launch dates of the two spacecraft. Determined to confirm the existence of the solar wind detected by Luna 1, Konstantin Gringauz redesigned his four sensor ion traps to use a "tetrahedral arrangement, instead of planar, to get better measurements of the plasma flux." There were also adjustments to the three-component fluxgate magnetometer so that its range factor was "reduced by a factor of 4 to -750 to +750 nanoteslas (gammas) so that the quantization uncertainty was -12 to +12 nT."

Mission Accomplished

Luna 2 accomplished its mission in nearly every way. It confirmed readings by Luna 1 and released an orange cloud of sodium gas, which helped the Soviets to track the spacecraft and study the behavior of gas in space. On September 14, 1959, just 36 hours after launch, Luna 2 met its predetermined fate. A sudden loss of radio communication confirmed that it had crashed into the Moon as planned, west of Mare Serenitatis or "The Sea of Serenity". Thirty minutes later, the third stage of the spacecraft's rocket (Luna 2 had no propulsion itself) became the second man-made object to strike the Moon. The nature of these impacts helped prove that the Moon had no appreciable magnetic field or radiation belts.

Soviet Legacy Strewn About

The Soviet space program left some early man-made marks on the moon. America's Cold War rival designed two spheres, each made of pentagonal pennants, which showed the emblem of the Soviet Union and the Cyrillic letters for the U.S.S.R. (CCCP). These metallic "soccer balls" were designed to shatter on impact and scatter the pennants over a large radius. The Soviet Union even went so far as having explosives on Luna 2 to slow the spacecraft's impact speed, ensuring that the pennants were not vaporized on impact. When Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev presented U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower one of the spherical pennants as a gift, it was made ever more clear that the race to the Moon was on.

Resources:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luna_2

https://www.mentallandscape.com/V_Pennants.htm