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ESA's Schiaparelli lander smashed on impact with Mars planet

Xinhua, October 22, 2016 Adjust font size:

The European Space Agency (ESA) has said Schiaparelli lander aimed to search for life on Mars, was destroyed on contact with the Red planet, adding works are underway to determine the clues of the space-probe carsh-landing.

In a statement issued on Friday, the ESA added images taken by NASA Mars orbiter showed that Schiaparelli dropped from a height of between 2 and 4 km, therefore impacting at a considerable speed, greater than 300 km/h.

"It is also possible that the lander exploded on impact, as its thruster propellant tanks were likely still full. These preliminary interpretations will be refined following further analysis," it said.

"The exact mode of anomaly on board Schiaparelli is still under investigation," it added.

ESA scientists have been decoding the data that the Schiaparelli lander transmitted before its signal was lost, "in order to establish correlations with the measurements made with the Giant Metrewave Radio Telescope (GMRT)" and "to be able to reconstruct the chain of events with great accuracy."

Schiaparelli, a disc-shaped 577-kg lander, is part of the European-Russian ExoMars program, which aims to search for signs of past and present life on Mars and evidence of methane and other trace atmospheric gases that could be signatures of active biological or geological processes.

A second ExoMars mission, planned in 2020, will include a Russian lander and a European rover, which will drill down to 2 m underground to look for pristine organic material.

Meanwhile, the Trace Gas Orbiter (TGO), the spacecraft on which the Schiaparelli lander travelled to Mars is working very well and will take science calibration data during two orbits in November 2016, according to the agency. Endit