Mars orbiter's decade-long mission probably over: NASA

0 Comments | AFP, November, 2006

LOS ANGELES (AFP) — The unexpectedly long 10-year-old mission of the Mars Global Surveyor probe is most likely over after contact with the orbiter was lost earlier this month, NASA said. Scientists said they suspected a damaged solar panel had left the craft unable to communicate with Earth following its successful decade-long sojourn around the Red Planet.

"We are facing the likelihood that the amazing flow of scientific observations from Mars Global Surveyor is over," said Fuk Li, Mars Exploration program manager at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California. "We are not giving up hope, though." NASA said another probe, the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, had pointed its cameras towards the Surveyor on Monday but found no sign of the craft. Surveyor was launched...