NASA’s Mars Atmosphere and Volatile EvolutioN, or MAVEN, mission returned to normal science and relay operations on May 28, 2022, after recovering from an extended safe mode event. The spacecraft encountered problems in February with its Inertial Measurement Units (IMUs). The mission team successfully diagnosed the issue with these navigation instruments and developed a system […]
Mars
Fleet Space Technologies Aims For Moon And Mars Missions With Help From Seven Sisters Consortium
Fleet Space Technologies has joined some of Australia, and the world’s major space and non-space organizations, in a bid to further the exploration of the Moon, Mars and the Earth. The ultimate purpose is to enable humanity’s exploration of new worlds. The Seven Sisters initiative represents a truly global collaboration. NASA intends to fly the […]
JAXA Awards MMX Mission Flight Units Contract To MDA
MDA Ltd. (TSX:MDA) has been awarded the full contract from MELCO (Mitsubishi Electric Corporation) in Japan to provide a Laser Rangefinder (LRF) altimeter for the JAXA (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency) MMX (Martian Moons eXploration) mission. MDA will be providing two redundant flight units (laser range finder – LRF) altimeters and one engineering development unit (EDU) […]
Rocket Lab Engaging Two Photon Spacecraft For A Science Mission To Mars For NASA’s ESCAPADE Quest
Rocket Lab will initiate final mission design and manufacture to supply two, interplanetary, Photon spacecraft for a science mission to Mars, delivering Decadal-class science at a fraction of the cost of typical planetary missions. The Escape and Plasma Acceleration and Dynamics Explorers (ESCAPADE) mission will orbit two, Rocket Lab-built Photon spacecraft around Mars to understand […]
Northrop Grumman To Power Mars Ascent Vehicle
Northrop Grumman Corporation (NYSE: NOC) has been selected by NASA to provide solid propulsion systems and controls for NASA’s Mars Ascent Vehicle (MAV), which will be launched to Mars in 2026 along with a “fetch” rover that will collect soil and rock samples prepared by NASA’s Perseverance rover, which launched in July of 2020 and […]
UPDATE 1: Mars + NASA Perseverance Rover: Continuing News
NASA’s Mars 2020 Perseverance rover got its first high-definition look around its new home in Jezero Crater on February 21 after rotating its mast, or “head,” 360 degrees, allowing the rover’s Mastcam-Z instrument to capture its first panorama after touching down on the Red Planet on February 18. This was the rover’s second panorama ever, […]
NASA’s Perseverance Rover Sends Sneak Peek of Mars Landing
Less than a day after NASA’s Mars 2020 Perseverance rover successfully landed on the surface of Mars, engineers and scientists at the agency’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California were hard at work, awaiting the next transmissions from Perseverance. As data gradually came in, relayed by several spacecraft orbiting the Red Planet, the Perseverance team […]
UPDATE 1: Perseverance Pays Off — ULA Lands NASA’s Rover Successfully Landing On Mars
Cheers erupted in mission control at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory as controllers confirmed that NASA’s Perseverance rover, with the Ingenuity Mars Helicopter attached to its belly, has touched down safely on Mars. Engineers are analyzing the data from the spacecraft. A post landing briefing is expected at 5:30 p.m. EST (2:30 p.m. PST) on NASA […]
L3Harris Receives Perseverance Rover Control Link Award
L3Harris Technologies’ (NYSE:LHX) avionics and communications technology will provide a critical link that enables NASA to control the Perseverance Rover when it lands on Mars and throughout the vehicle’s 10-year life expectancy. L3Harris communications technology will transmit data to and from Perseverance through relay orbiters that then provide a communications link with NASA controllers on […]