Luna programme became the first probe to achieve a soft landing on another planetary body. It returned five black and white stereoscopic circular panoramas, which were the first close-up shots of the Lunar surface. "Luna 10" (March 1966) became the first artificial satellite of the Moon. "Luna 17" (November 1970) and "Luna 21" (January 1973) carried the Lunokhod vehicles, which roamed around on the Moon's terrain. Another major achievement of the Luna programme, with "Luna 16" (September 1970), "Luna 20" (February 1972) and "Luna 24" (August 1976), was the ability to collect samples of lunar soil and return them to Earth. The
Luna 2 time of impact, and the transmission and trajectory details. Even though Soviet scientists gave all this information, the Americans were still skeptical until Bernard Lovell was able to prove that the radio signal was coming from "Luna 2" by showing the Doppler shift from its transmissions. After this no one seemed to question the veracity of the Soviets. "Luna 2" showed time variations in the electron flux and energy spectrum in the Van Allen radiation belt. The spacecraft also carried Soviet pennants. Two of them, located in the spacecraft, were sphere-shaped, with the surface covered by identical pentagonal elements. In