Luna 8 velocity sufficiently for a survivable landing, "Luna 8" plummeted to the lunar surface and crashed at 21:51:30 UT on 6 December in the west of Oceanus Procellarum. The coordinates of the crash site are . Luna 8 Luna 8 (E-6 series), also known as Lunik 8, was a lunar space probe of the Luna program. It was launched in on December 3, 1965 with the objective of achieving a soft landing on the Moon. However, its retrorocket firing occurred too late, and suffered a hard impact on the lunar surface on the Oceanus Procellarum (Ocean of Storms). The mission did
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