Russia has reported an “abnormal situation” at its moon-bound spacecraft which launched earlier this month.
Luna-25 is an unmanned robot lander and the country’s first mission to the lunar surface in almost 50 years.
It’s aiming to touch down at the moon’s south pole on Monday, but appears to have run into unspecified trouble while preparing for a pre-landing orbit.
Russia’s space agency, Roskosmos, said its specialists were analysing the situation.
No further details have been provided.
It comes a week after the craft’s data-collecting equipment was switched on following its launch from Russia’s Vostochny cosmodrome in the country’s far eastern Amur region.
Russia hopes when Luna-25 lands, it will spend a year collecting samples of rock and dust to get a sense of whether the moon could support a permanent base for humans.
