1957–1969: Opening the Space Age
Luna 10
First artificial satellite of the Moon.
Era 1 of 6 · full record in the catalog
- Launch
- 31 Jan 1966
- Lead / partner
- Soviet Union
- Target
- Moon
- Category
- Lunar orbiter
- Status
- Success
- Vehicle
- Molniya-M 8K78M s
- Mass
- unknown
- Orbit / trajectory
- Geocentric
- Duration
- 6 days, 11 hours, 10 minutes
Why it happened
Luna 10 flew during 1957–1969: Opening the Space Age, as part of Soviet Union's work toward moon. A sourced write-up of the context around this mission is still on the editorial queue; nothing here is invented to fill the gap.
The mission
The full narrative of this mission is pending research and writing. What is recorded so far: First artificial satellite of the Moon.
Results
First artificial satellite of the Moon.
Related missions
Sources & image credits
- Gregory H. Revera, via Wikimedia Commons · CC BY-SA 3.0 · license: cc-by-sa-3.0 (source, checked 2026-08-23)
- Mission record: AntarikshPedia canonical dataset (data-sources/missions_timeline.md)
- Specifications reference: NASA NSSDCA Master Catalog
