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Luna 3, an automatic interplanetary station, was the third spacecraft successfully launched to the
Moon and the first to return images of the lunar far side. The craft was a cylindrically shaped
cannister which was equipped with radio communication and telemetering systems, an imaging system
with an automatic film processing unit, a set of scientific instruments, three solar cells for
electric power supply, and a temperature control system. It had gas jets for stabilization and
photoelectric cells to maintain orientation with respect to the Sun and Moon.
This spacecraft was controlled by radio command from Earth. It was launched on a figure-eight
trajectory which brought it over the Moon (closest approach to the Moon was 6200 km) and around the
far side, which was sunlit at the time. It was stabilized while in optical view of the far side of
the Moon. On October 7, 1959, the television system obtained a series of 29 photographs over 40
minutes, covering 70% of the surface, that were developed on-board the spacecraft. The photographs
were scanned and 17 were radio transmitted to ground stations in facsimile form on October 18, 1959,
as the spacecraft, in a barycentric orbit, returned near to the Earth. The photographs were to be
retransmitted at another point close to Earth but were not.
The spacecraft returned very indistinct pictures, but, through computer enhancement, a tentative
atlas of the lunar farside was produced. These first views of the lunar far side showed mountainous
terrain, very different from the near side, and two dark regions which were named Mare Moscovrae (Sea
of Moscow) and Mare Desiderii (Sea of Dreams).
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