Information and data about prospector project.

Clementine Project Information High Resolution Strip Mosaics - from the Clementine HiRes Camera now available on CD-ROM at NSSDC Clementine was a joint project between the Strategic Defense Initiative Organization and NASA. The objective of the mission was to test sensors and spacecraft components under extended exposure to the space environment and to make scientific observations of the Moon ...

The first U.S. spacecraft to land safely on the Moon. Information about surveyor missions 1 through 7.

Soviet Lunar Missions The image at the top of the page is the first image of the far side of the Moon, taken by the Luna 3 spacecraft in October, 1959. The Soviet Lunar program had 20 successful missions to the Moon and achieved a number of notable lunar firsts : first probe to impact the Moon, first flyby and image of the lunar farside, first soft landing, first lunar orbiter, and the first ...

Five Lunar Orbiter missions were launched in 1966 through 1967 with the purpose of mapping the lunar surface before the Apollo landings. Experiments and results from all five missions are included here.

Ranger (1961 - 1965) The Ranger series was the first U.S. attempt to obtain close-up images of the Lunar surface. The Ranger spacecraft were designed to fly straight down towards the Moon and send images back until the moment of impact. Shown above is the Ranger spacecraft and an image of the Moon taken by the Ranger 7 A series camera immediately before impact. This image has a resolution of .5 ...

THE CLEMENTINE MISSION The Clementine Spacecraft Clementine was the first of a new class of small spacecraft to enable long-duration deep space missions at low cost using lightweight satellite technology. Along with its primary mission to test this new technology, it returned valuable lunar data to the scientific community. Clementine was launched on January 25, 1994, from Vandenburg Air Force ...

THE SURVEYOR PROGRAM The Surveyor Spacecraft The Surveyor program consisted of seven unmanned lunar missions that were launched between May 1966 and January 1968. Five of these spacecraft, Surveyor 1, 3, 5, 6, and 7 successfully soft-landed on the lunar surface. In addition to demonstrating the feasibility of lunar surface landings, the Surveyor missions obtained lunar and cislunar photographs ...

THE LUNAR ORBITER PROGRAM The Lunar Orbiter Spacecraft The Lunar Orbiter program, initiated in early 1964, consisted of the investigation of the Moon by five identical unmanned spacecraft. The spacecraft weighed approximately 390 kilograms at launch, were 1.5 meters in diameter, and were 2 meters in length. Solar panels supplied the required power. The main purpose of the program was to locate ...

THE LUNAR PROSPECTOR MISSION The Lunar Prospector Spacecraft Lunar Prospector was one of the NASA Discovery Program missions. It was designed to perform a low polar orbit investigation of the Moon. This included mapping the surface composition and locating lunar resources, measuring magnetic and gravity fields, and studying outgassing events. The data from this mission, which carried only ...

THE LUNA MISSIONS The Luna Spacecraft The Luna Program was one of two lunar exploration programs conducted by the Soviet Union. This was a very long-running program, with the first mission flying in 1959 and the last flying in 1976. The Luna missions were designed to collect information about the Moon and its environment, not only for scientific purposes but also to be used in the planning of ...

THE ZOND MISSIONS The Zond Spacecraft The Zond Program was one of two lunar exploration programs conducted by the Soviet Union to investigate the Moon and its vicinity. This program began in 1964 and ended in 1979. While the Zond program is considered here as a lunar program, it should be noted that Zond 1 was sent in the direction of Venus and Zond 2 in the direction of Mars. Also, the later ...

Lunar Prospector Lunar Prospector (LP) was a spin-stabilized spacecraft, operating in a 100 km circular, polar orbit around the Moon during its Primary Mission in 1998. The orbit was lowered to 30 km for the Extended Mission that began in January 1999. The mission ended on July 31, 1999, when the spacecraft was targeted to impact a crater near the lunar south pole to try to vaporize part of the ...