Cohete N1: el ‘’Saturno V soviético’’

Video from the channel Absolute Zero about N1, linked on its Above Ten Thousand entry. Duration: 13:29. Language: Spanish. Video type: Documentary.

Spanish-language educational video about the N1, the great Soviet Moon rocket, and about why the Soviet Union never reached the Moon. The author presents it as the real hidden story of the Moon race: not a faked landing, but the USSR's decades-long silence about its own attempt to reach the Moon.

It starts with John F. Kennedy's speech to Congress on 25 May 1961, a month after Yuri Gagarin's flight and four years after the first artificial satellite. According to the video, the Kremlin barely took the challenge seriously, while by late 1962 the United States had already chosen its rocket, tested the most powerful engine ever built up to then, and fixed the architecture of its missions. OKB-1 was then working on the N1 without a finalized design or a concrete goal.

The video explains the N1's disadvantages compared with the Saturn V. Baikonur sits at about 46 degrees of latitude versus Cape Canaveral's 28.5, which reduces the boost from Earth's rotation. The disagreement between Sergei Korolev and Valentin Glushko over propellants led to the engines being commissioned from another, less experienced bureau: the first stage needed 30 NK-15 engines versus the Saturn V's five F-1s, the rocket required five stages versus three, and it placed 95 tonnes in low orbit versus 140. Its four launches all failed to reach orbit, the program was cancelled in 1974, and its existence only came to light gradually under Mikhail Gorbachev.