OREANDA-NEWS. A group of Russian engineers and astronautics enthusiasts have prepared a microsatellite project for recording traces of American astronauts landing on the Moon, Soviet landing stations and lunar rovers. This was reported by a RIA Novosti correspondent from the Moscow Planetarium, where the presentation of the project began.

The start of the project was announced in 2015; more than 1.5 million rubles were collected for it on the Internet using crowdfunding. As the developers explained, the preliminary design of the satellite has now been completed, the appearance of which was presented in 2019 at the Museum of Cosmonautics.

"Now the traces of the first researchers are of historical interest: Luna-9, the Soviet apparatus that was the first to make a soft landing on the Moon, has not been found. It is interesting to look at our Lunokhod and, of course, the footprints of astronauts. I am sure that such a launch will attract the attention of everyone. world, so we hope to find support from those who care about such attention. We want to offer patrons and sponsors a new opportunity - to make a contribution to space exploration, "- said the initiator of the project Vitaly Egorov to RIA Novosti.

A lunar microsatellite weighing less than 100 kg is proposed to be launched along the way on one of the Russian rockets. The device should be equipped with a camera with a telescope to examine the details of the lunar surface up to 25 cm in size from a height of 50 km.

The tasks of the spacecraft involve reconnaissance of past, present and future lunar landing sites - both under domestic and foreign programs. The satellite will be able to map in high detail the most interesting parts of the Moon for scientists.

To implement the project, the developers founded the Orbital Express company.