Luna X Sending Valuable Data

Press, Volume CV, Issue 31031, 11 April 1966, Page 9

Luna X Sending Valuable Data

(N.Z. Press Association—Copyright)

MOSCOW, April 10.

The Russian Luna X spacecraft, in orbit around the moon, has discovered “fluxes of electrons” 70 to 100 times more intense than cosmic rays, the Soviet news agency Tass reported.

The Tass announcement started speculation that Luna X might have uncovered radiation potentially deadly to anyone attempting to land on the moon.

The powerful electrons discovered by the spacecraft near the moon, Tass said, could be

attributed to the “earth’s magnetic tail” but gave no further explanation. Luna X achieved the first orbit of the moon last Sunday and has been radioing scientific data back to earth from its egg-shaped path since then. “Data has been obtained which may be interpreted as evidence of the existence in the near lunar space of fluxes of electrons with energies of tens of thousands of electron volts,” the news agency said. The agency said later measurements would “permit more positive conclusions on the radiation conditions near the moon.”

The Russians have reported that a great deal of scientific data had been obtained from the spacecraft, including information on gamma, thermal and fluorescent radiation.