Ye-8-5M n°412

Luna E-8-5M No.412, also known as Luna Ye-8-5M No.412, and sometimes identified by NASA as Luna 1975A, was a Soviet spacecraft which was lost in a launch failure in 1975. It was a 5,300 kg Luna E-8-5M spacecraft, the second of three to be launched. It was intended to perform a soft landing on the Moon, collect a sample of lunar soil, and return it to the Earth. Luna E-8-5M No.412 was launched atop a Proton-K 8K78K launch vehicle with a Blok D-1 upper stage, flying from Site 81/23 at the Baikonur Cosmodrome. Prior to the release of information about its mission, NASA correctly identified that it had been an attempted sample return mission. They believed that it was intended to land in Mare Crisium, which was the target for both the Luna 23 and Luna 24 missions; which landed a few hundred metres apart. Since its launch was unsuccessful, it was not acknowledged in the Soviet press at the time.