Failed · Failure
Ranger 5 was a Block II Ranger similar to Rangers 3 and 4, intended to photograph the Moon during descent and deliver a seismometer capsule to the surface. An unknown malfunction after injection left the spacecraft without power, its batteries ran down after 8 hours and 44 minutes, and it missed the Moon by 725 km.
- Destinations
- Moon
- Launch vehicle
- Atlas-Agena B
- Launch site
- Cape Canaveral, United States
- Countries
- United States
- Mission types
- Impactor, Lander
Chronology
Mission timeline
Loss of contact
Ranger 5 batteries ran down after 8 hours, 44 minutes, rendering the spacecraft inoperable
Earth
Mission architecture
Vehicles
Ranger 5 · Spacecraft
Destinations: Moon
Trajectory record
Trajectory dataset not yet available
No verified trajectory dataset is committed for this mission, so Mission Atlas renders no path.
Provenance
Sources
Each source is listed once and labeled with the mission, event, trajectory, or destination/body context it supports.
Data verified through August 24, 2026
- Ranger 5 - NASA NSSDCA Spacecraft Details — NSSDCAArchive · Supports: mission claims · event claims
- Moon Facts — NASAOther · Supports: destination/body context
- Planet Sizes and Locations in Our Solar System — NASAOther · Supports: destination/body context