OTD In Space – January 8: Soviet Union Launches 2nd Lunar Rover

On January 8, 1973, the Soviet Union launched the Luna 21 mission to land a rover on the moon.

This was the second time that the Soviet Union put a rover on the moon and it was the 13th successful lunar landing of the Luna program. Like the other Luna missions, Luna 21 was an unscrewed, robotic spacecraft. It launched on a Proton rocket and touched down in the Le Monnier crater one week later. About three hours after landing, it deployed the rover, Lunokhod 2. The rover traveled about 24 miles and took more than 80,000 photos on the moon before it accidentally rolled into a crater, where it got dust all over its solar panels and died.