Venera 16

Venera 16 (Russian: Венера-16 meaning Venus 16) was a spacecraft sent to Venus by the Soviet Union. This unmanned orbiter was to map the surface of Venus using high resolution imaging systems. The spacecraft was identical to Venera 15 and based on modifications to the earlier Venera space probes.

Mission profile

Venera 16 was launched on June 7, 1983 at 02:32:00 UTC and reached Venus' orbit on October 11, 1983.

The spacecraft was inserted into Venus orbit a day apart from Venera 15, with its orbital plane shifted by an angle of approximately 4° relative to one another probe. This made it possible to reimage an area if necessary. The spacecraft was in a nearly polar orbit with a periapsis ~1000 km, at 62°N latitude, and apoapsis ~65000 km, with an inclination ~90°, the orbital period being ~24 hours.

Together with Venera 15, the spacecraft imaged the area from the north pole down to about 30°N latitude (i.e. approx. 25% of Venus surface) over the 8 months of mapping operations.

Spacecraft structure