The Explorers' Club, № DCCCXLII

Operation AXIOM: Destination Moon—The 51st Anniversary of Luna 16
12-24 September 1970: The Luna 16 probe lifted off from the Kazakh S.S.R.'s Baikonur Cosmodrome atop a Proton-K rocket; the probe landed on the Mare Fecunditatis, collected soil samples, & sealed those samples inside an ascent stage, which lifted off from the Moon & landed back in the Kazakh S.S.R.; this was Mankind's third lunar sample-return mission, the Soviets' first, & the first robotic one.

Commentary: Luna 16 returned one hundred one grams (101 g) of lunar soil samples. By contrast, Apollo 11 returned in excess of twenty-one kilograms (21.55 kg) & Apollo 12 returned in excess of thirty-four kilograms (34.35 kg) of lunar samples. That's almost fifty six kilograms (55.9 kg) versus one hundred one grams (101 g), giving crewed missions a massive advantage over robotic probes.

Semper exploro.