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Why was Luna 3 important for studying the Moon?
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Moon
(Left) Near side of Earth's Moon, photographed by the Galileo spacecraft on its way to Jupiter. (Right) Far side of the Moon with some of the near side visible (upper right), photographed by the Apollo 16 spacecraft.
Launched on October 4, 1959, the Soviet Luna 3 probe was a landmark achievement in space exploration because it performed the first circumnavigation of the Moon and returned the first photographs of its far side.12
For millennia, the appearance of the Moonâs unseen side had remained a mystery. The images captured by Luna 3 dispelled this mystery, revealing that the far side was significantly different from the near side. While the near side is characterized by large, dark maria, the Luna 3 photographs showed that the far side consisted mostly of highlands with only small areas of dark mare material. This mission provided the first scientific look at the lunar surface features that are permanently hidden from view from Earth.32