Signal from Mars moon craft
Source: Agencies |
November 24, 2011, Thursday
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Print Edition
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THE European Space Agency has received the first signal from an unmanned Russian spacecraft bound for a moon of Mars since it got stuck in Earth's orbit two weeks ago, officials said yesterday, raising hope the mission might be saved.
Russia's space agency said an ESA tracking facility in Australia got the signal from the Phobos-Ground probe early yesterday in the western city of Perth.
ESA's teams of flight dynamics technicians, who calculate the orbits, and the operational center staff had been helping to try to communicate with the Russian probe for the past 10 days, said Bernhard von Weyhe a spokesman for ESA, based at its operational headquarters in Darmstadt, Germany.
Roscosmos said Russian and European space experts will coordinate further attempts to contact the probe. Weyhe said the next try would occur later yesterday when the spacecraft is expected to pass over the satellite dishes in Australia.
Weyhe said that technicians in Perth used a little side antenna rigged with a cone to send up a wide, but weak, signal to the probe.
"We did it as if the probe was on Mars, not only 200 to 340 kilometers away from Earth," Weyhe said.
The US$170 million craft became stranded in orbit after its thrusters failed to fire following the November 9 launch to send it on its path to one of Mars' two moons, Phobos.
Roscosmos' deputy chief, Vitaly Davydov, said that experts will keep trying until the end of the month to fix the probe and steer it to its flight path.
If they fail, the craft could plummet to Earth between late December and late February, he warned.
Russia's space agency said an ESA tracking facility in Australia got the signal from the Phobos-Ground probe early yesterday in the western city of Perth.
ESA's teams of flight dynamics technicians, who calculate the orbits, and the operational center staff had been helping to try to communicate with the Russian probe for the past 10 days, said Bernhard von Weyhe a spokesman for ESA, based at its operational headquarters in Darmstadt, Germany.
Roscosmos said Russian and European space experts will coordinate further attempts to contact the probe. Weyhe said the next try would occur later yesterday when the spacecraft is expected to pass over the satellite dishes in Australia.
Weyhe said that technicians in Perth used a little side antenna rigged with a cone to send up a wide, but weak, signal to the probe.
"We did it as if the probe was on Mars, not only 200 to 340 kilometers away from Earth," Weyhe said.
The US$170 million craft became stranded in orbit after its thrusters failed to fire following the November 9 launch to send it on its path to one of Mars' two moons, Phobos.
Roscosmos' deputy chief, Vitaly Davydov, said that experts will keep trying until the end of the month to fix the probe and steer it to its flight path.
If they fail, the craft could plummet to Earth between late December and late February, he warned.
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