Venera 14
Venera 14 — Venera 13's twin (landed 5 March 1982, about 950 km from it). It took colour panoramas, drilled a sample and found rock like the basalts of Earth's ocean floors, and survived 57 minutes against a planned 32, at 470 °C and 94 atmospheres.
Key facts
Mission & specifications
Mission
- Operator
- Lavochkin (USSR)
- Launched
- November 4, 1981
- Status
- Completed
Trajectory
- Distance from the Sun
- 0.726 AU
- Computed from the cached position
- Distance from Earth
- 0.381 AU
- Computed from cached positions
- Distance from Venus
- 0.191 AU
- Computed from cached positions
Mission
Venera 14 was the twin of Venera 13, launched five days after it on 4 November 1981. An error in its first course correction had to be put right by two more. Its lander separated on 3 March 1982 and, after a parachute descent and a free fall braked by the thick air, landed on 5 March at 07:00 UT on a basaltic plain near the eastern flank of Phoebe Regio, about 950 km southwest of Venera 13. It took colour panoramas of its surroundings, and a drilling arm collected a sample into a sealed chamber, where an X-ray fluorescence spectrometer found it similar to the basalts of Earth's ocean floors. Its seismometer recorded two events, though they may have been the lander's own operations, and an acoustic detector picked up the sounds of the spacecraft and the wind. It lasted 57 minutes, against a design life of 32, at 470 °C and 94 atmospheres. It was the last Soviet landing on Venus until the Vega landers three years later.
- 1981Venera 14 launches toward Venus on a Proton rocketLaunch
Venera 13's twin sets out five days behind it.
About 950 km from Venera 13, on a basaltic plain.
- 1982Colour panoramas and a drilled sampleMilestone
Its rock resembles Earth's ocean-floor basalts; it survives 57 minutes.
Images
Images from open archives · credit shown per image