25? the russian spacecraft crashed instead of making a soft landing at the lunar south pole. what lessons are learned from the failure? this is inside story. laura: welcome to the program. it was a mission to elevate russia's standing at home and in

space, but the luna-25 spacecraft failed to stick its landing. its crash is raising questions about moscow's space programme, particularly as russia becomes more isolated from the west. competition is relentless. like russia, china, india and the united states are also looking to explore whether ice and other resources can be found at the lunar south pole. so, how big a setback has the kremlin suffered? and what does it mean for rival programmes and business ventures out of this world? we will get to that with our guests in a moment. reporter: it was russia's first mission to the moon in 50 years. but the luna 25 failed to live up to its name. it crashed onto the surface of the moon, exposing challenges perhaps beyond russia space program. >> western sanctions imposed on

russia prevented them access to high-performing components which they needed. the supply chain has collapsed and they have to either bypass it or build instrumentation at home. reporter: the race is about space exploration and prestige, but also about business. scientists believe parts of the moon may hold deposits of ice for drinking water and other elements that in the future could be mined for astronauts. the competition is growing. india is expected its own spacecraft to do what the russians cannot and land on the lunar south pole on wednesday. along with the united states, china and russia, india is spending big on expanding its reach in space. >> it is a moment of glory for india.

we are part of the history. reporter: collaboration between the russian space agency and some of its counterparts like nasa were broken off after russia's invasion of ukraine. some analysts said the luna 25 crash underscores the decline of russian space power. sputnik one was the first satellite ever to orbit the earth. it is not uncommon for space missions to fail, but russia needed a win as a sign of defiance and national pride. laura: let's bring in our guests. steve maran, retired astronomer from nasa. he is also author of the

guidebook "astronomy for dummies." anil kumar bhatt, retired lieutenant general from the indian army and director general of the indian space association. derrick pitts, chief astronomer and planetarium programmes director at the franklin institute. a warm welcome to all of you. the big question everyone is asking is what happened? what went wrong with the luna 25 ? >> for the reports we have had so far there is an indication there was a malfunction with a landing maneuver that the russians were attempting to begin the landing sequence. they were moving from one orbit level to another and as far as we know, either the rocket fired too long or too little or in the wrong direction. the result was a crash onto the surface. laura: steve, how embarrassing

is this for moscow? it is a far cry from the sophisticated space program of the former soviet union. >> it certainly is. they landed a number of times in the past on the moon. they landed successfully, the only ones to do it, 10 times on the surface of venus. the crash comes at an embarrassing time because another nation is about to try to do the same thing. in fairness, there are crashes on the moon all the time. or are two crashes in april alone of this year by two different nations. laura: steve, why do you think it happened at this particular time? should we be looking at

geopolitical reasons or the state of russia's economy? >> maybe ukraine not so much because this lunar attempted landing has been planned for a long time, but at some point, what was the soviet program became the russia program, lost a lot of funding. the truth that most of the early space programs were intended for geopolitical prestige more than science and so they have not had the steady funding that nasa and other nations have had for many years and get practice in flying missions with all the latest technology. the russians may also be behind in some technologies. also, there are crashes and unexpected events that can occur

to anybody's program. laura: let's get to india. just before we do, i can see you want to say something. >> in addition to that, the other thing is that a has not helped the russian space program at all, the embargoes that have been imposed since the beginning of the conflict with ukraine. one result of that is the lack of supply of hardened electronics and very reliable electronics that are needed to sustain spacecraft. we do not think of space really in the way we should. it is not a benign environment. it is very difficult on electronics. it makes this work difficult for any country, but if you do not have the components you need, a really does multiply your chances that you might run into a problem.

laura: let's move on to india. hot on the heels of russia, could be the first nation to land on the far side of the moon. are you confident of success? >> definitely after india already had two missions, one was a total success, one was partially successful. the lessons learned from that i am very sure have been [indiscernible] at this time, they have had all of the [indiscernible] they had learned the right missions. i am sure we will have very good news in the next two days. i am confident this time we will do it. laura: the differences here

between yours and the russian program is as you say it is the third time you have attempted this. the russians had not tried to land on the moon in 50 years. >> yes. there has been a large gap. maybe there was some loss of expertise. any small mistake can lead to a successful mission becoming unsuccessful. laura: i guess that is what makes it so fascinating. give us an idea about what india's mission will be on the south pole of the moon. >> the stated mission is a soft

landing on the moon on the south side. there will be a number of scientific tests, including the testing of soil and other scientific instruments. laura: one more question to you. india was the first to discover water on the moon some 10 years ago. that is a key issue for people to return their. do we have any idea how to extract water from the moon? >> mean not being a scientist would not be able to answer your question completely, but what we have learned from our first

mission, we are expecting that on the southern side we will find water. and that would be very important for future missions going to the moon or maybe for exploration of all the parts of space. laura: steve, what happens when one finds water on the moon? >> the big step unfortunately in the opinion of some people concerned about preserving the lunar environment like a national park is that you find ways to exploit it. while it is critical to find ice come out we are pretty sure there is no bottled water or an ocean there. it is going to be in the form of ice. there are some traces of water vapor because the ice

evaporates. you have to see exactly what form the ice is. is that all tiny particles mixed up in the lunar soil, which is sharp and cutting particles and dangerous to handle, let alone inhale. exactly what form it is and develop the technology that best extracts it, filters out the rock particles and turns it into the liquid or compressed gas. and you need this water because if you are going to have people working on the moon for more than a few days as they did when the nasa astronauts were there in the 1970's, they have to have oxygen to breathe, water to

drink and for other purposes. if you have almost any other industrial process, you need water. you can get from earth for a few days. you cannot bring enough to stay there for a month or two or indefinitely because for every pound of water you need many more pounds of rocket propellant. you need a rocket even bigger than elon musk contemplates making. to live on the moon, you need water and oxygen. you can get the water from the ice. you can take some of the water and split it into oxygen and hydrogen. the oxygen to breathe or to be used as the rocket fuel to get you home or go somewhere else. water is critical. laura: do you think we should exploit the water and the

resources on the moon, or should we preserve the natural environment? >> i think you can do both, as we do on earth. there are people who fear the miners will have a bad record on the moon where there is no local inhabitants to have a picket line. it is almost inevitable. they may start because of political rivalry, but there are also resources there. one thing that has not been mention is the helium-3, a rare isotope which is apparently present in the lunar soil where it has been trapped from the solar wind that beats down on the moon continuously. it does not beat down on the surface of the earth because it is deflected by radiation. helium-3 is considered the ideal

fuel for future nuclear fusion plants that might solve the energy problem on earth. laura: steve has brought up a lot of points. a lot of valuable resources appear to be on the moon. is there going to be a big question about who owns them? who has the right to exploit them and who can benefit from them? >> who knew the south pole of the moon would become so popular? it was the discovery of water there that really started that part of the popularity of the moon. st points out, this is incredibly important because of the need for the resources to explore the rest of the solar system. as far as ownership of the moon is concerned, there have been policies in place since the 1960's that talk about

ownership, and the intention was that the moon would be very much like the research basis in antarctica, where nobody owns the moon. it really has been brought down to who can get there first to exploit what resources are there. i do not think we are going to see any time soon any kind of lease arrangements or any kind of real estate sales of parcels of the moon or anything like that. it comes down to who gets there first to make use of the resources. laura: with india leading the race, is this a conversation that is being had in new delhi? why is the prime minister may can space exploration such a priority? >> space is the ultimate in science. fortunately for india, the last

60 years, [indiscernible] space has become unnecessary -- a necessary part. even our prime minister in 2020 made the announcement to open up space to the private sector. laura: the private startups have

doubled since 2020 in india. do they support the national program or are they in competition with it? how does it all work? >> they are totally in coordination with the national program. we have had one successful launch by a startup. very soon they will have an orbital launch. another company looking to make engines by 3d technology. it is a win-win situation. even some new startups will be able to launch successfully and have been provided support from the government.

>> with all due respect to all of the players in the space industry, we also have to keep in mind that this is also a question of national pride for every country involved in this. it is also a story of technological superiority. one of the things that drove the space race is the desire to demonstrate a technological superiority that is held by a nation and is a great source of national pride. we cannot leave out the fact that happened that technological superiority in space also indicates to everyone else that you have the superior technology capability that may be beyond everybody else. that is also a very serious

consideration when we think about the other pieces of wanting to do space exploration. the altruistic pieces are nice, but let's not forget the part about national pride and demonstration of technological superiority. laura: that is a fair point. there is a parallel track of national ambition and science. do these two tracks go hand-in-hand when it comes to exploring space? you have the commercial aspects too. are they in conflict with each other? >> there is no more important satellite launcher then spacex, private company. it launches more satellites every year than everybody else on earth together.

they do not launch more rockets than china, but they launch rockets every week with dozens of satellites on board. you get to the moon and nobody owns the place you are landing, nobody owns the place you are exploiting. the international space agreements say other bodies in the solar system beyond earth are common property. they do not lay down any principles. if they did, it does not mean we or anybody else would always follow them. the question is, whoever lands first near the south pole of the moon, where you have continuous solar energy available and continuous dark shadow, what if

somebody lands right next to them? are they casting a shadow on their solar panel? are they encroaching on their limited deposit of ice? there is a lot of moon out there. there are not a lot of gnomic great places to land right now. -- known great places to land right now. what about communications back to earth? what about keeping time? time runs faster on the moon. that is a problem we are beginning to worry about. what about relating communications? does everybody have to have their own satellite orbit in the moon and interfering with the

radio telescopes, which astana most hope -- which astronomers hope would be put on the backside of the moon and listen on the other planets and solar systems. there needs to be, infrastructure. -- common infrastructure. there are a lot of human problems to be solved. laura: absolutely. where is the united states in their space program? why are we not seeing america trying to land on the south side of the moon? >> well, but that is where we are heading. the artemis program that nasa has undertaken, we are building

new capsules to land on the moon. it is planning to do its next lunar orbits in 2025. they have plans to have boots on the moon in just a few years right after that. nasa has a program operating that plants to return people to the moon. the one thing nasa always says is that in 2025 or 2026 or 2027, we are going to land the first person of color on the moon. there are two aspects that are critically important going forward. one is that when you look at commercial models for space exploration, there really are not in the working financial models that make sense yet. you can launch plenty of satellites, but who was really making money on a long-term

basis? is there a financial model that makes sense for an independent company to spend time miming space somehow? number two on the other side, this is challenging. space is hard. space is dangerous. the one thing that could help everyone would be if this was a community endeavor instead of a separate endeavor by individual countries. we could share the expense and the risks and the resources. but so far, because of the fact that this is about national pride and the demonstration of technological superiority, we are in a place where we are all trying to do it individually. laura: do you hope for more cooperation in the future?

>> one domain where there has been cooperation. space is one domain where all nations have cooperated. yes, there is national pride. there was at one time of major competition. but if you see the international space station, it has been a great example of cooperation. i see cooperation like that in the future also when we explore the moon. laura: on that very positive note, thank you to our guests for joining us.

best of luck with the scheduled landing on wednesday. and thank you too for watching. you can see the program any time by visiting our website at aljazeera.com. you can also join the conversation on x. from the whole team here, goodbye for now.

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