Despite the modest results obtained by India, the rover mission to Mars launched by the Asian country is One of the most notable achievements of the era of modern space flight.
The mission was launched in 2013, and was India’s first to Mars, and aims to reach orbit around the Red Planet, a journey that the United States, the former Soviet Union and the European Space Agency are only succeeded before then.
Perhaps most importantly, India has shown that a highly efficient spacecraft capable of reaching Mars can be developed on a tight budget.
Instead of costing hundreds of millions of dollars, the Mars mission was developed for only about $ 25 million, through a process that Indian officials have described as “economic engineering,” according to arstechnica and seen by Al Arabiya.net.
But all good things come to an end and last weekend the Indian space agency, ISRO, declared the mission and the aircraft “unrecoverable” over.
It arrived after a one-day meeting to discuss a problem with the spacecraft and whether it could be saved after losing contact with the spacecraft in April during a long eclipse when Mars moved between orbit and the sun.
“During the national meeting, ISRO found that the aircraft’s propulsion system was exhausted and, therefore, it was not possible to achieve the desired goal for sustainable energy production,” the space agency said in a published update. Monday.
He added: “The spacecraft has been declared unrecoverable and has reached the end of its life. The mission will be considered a remarkable technological and scientific achievement in the history of planetary exploration.”
The probe certainly exceeded expectations and was originally designed for six months and has been returning data to Earth for nearly 8 years.
Among his scientific contributions are regular images of the entire disk of Mars, in color, due to the spacecraft’s elliptical orbit.
Most spacecraft orbiting Mars spend their time relatively close to the planet, looking directly at the surface.
The Mars Orbiter mission also provided valuable data on the thin Martian atmosphere and observed dust storms.
Indian officials said more than 7,200 users have signed up to download the mission’s data for free.
During the meeting, scientists and engineers discussed the challenge of keeping the craft alive for long eclipse periods of up to 7 hours.
Much of the propellant aboard the spacecraft was supposed to be spent 5 years ago repositioning the spacecraft to survive these eclipses and ensure enough sunlight reached its solar panels.
After the success of the Mars Orbiter mission, India has allocated more resources for the lunar and Martian missions, as the country has planned several missions to the lunar surface, with the ultimate goal of returning samples.
Another rover around Mars is expected in the coming years, with a rover to follow during the second half of the 1920s.
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