La misión lunar soviética perdida: ¿Qué hubiera pasado si el cohete N1 hubiera funcionado? 🚀

Video from the channel Mecánica Orbital about N1, linked on its Above Ten Thousand entry. Duration: 23:01. Language: Spanish. Video type: Documentary.

An explanation of the N1, the Soviet launcher designed to carry cosmonauts to the Moon and compete with the American Saturn V. The video reconstructs what a complete lunar mission would have looked like had the rocket worked. It also compares the Soviet spacecraft with those of the Apollo program and reviews the causes of the failure.

The N1 was the Soviet Union's great lunar project of the space race. Its four launch attempts, between 1969 and 1972, all ended in failure, and the program was cancelled in 1974, after the United States reached the Moon. The video attributes the failure to several factors. The first stage's 30 NK-15 engines were new, poorly tested and prone to vibration, fires and ignition failures. Political and economic pressures prevented full integrated testing, and the rushed design had little redundancy. After Sergei Korolev's death there was no unified leadership, and the program competed for resources with other Soviet space projects.

According to the video, the rocket was 105 m tall, weighed over 2,700 tonnes, and could carry about 95 tonnes to low orbit and about 23 tonnes toward the Moon. The first stage, block A, produced 45,400 kN of thrust for about 125 seconds. The first three stages placed the lunar stack into low orbit in about nine minutes: blocks G and D, the Soyuz 7K-LOK orbiter for two cosmonauts, and the LK lunar lander for a single cosmonaut. Compared with the Apollo lunar module, built for two astronauts with separate descent and ascent stages, the LK was smaller and simpler.

In the mission profile described, after a few hours in Earth orbit block G would perform the translunar injection. Block D would correct the trajectory and brake to enter a lunar orbit of about 100 km. One cosmonaut would transfer to the LK via a spacewalk; block D would begin the descent and jettison before touchdown, and the LK would complete the landing. After collecting samples, the LK would lift off to rendezvous with the Soyuz, which would return to Earth and land in Kazakhstan.