ESA has revealed new details about what they think occur to their Mars lander and , well , it does n’t sound too good at the here and now .
To recap , the Schiaparelli Entry , Descent and Landing Demonstrator Module ( EDM ) was conjecture toland on Mars yesterday , part of the broader ExoMars missionary post . Its basal end was to test bring down capability for an upcoming wanderer in 2021 .
However , it miscarry to station a radio sign back to Earth to say it had landed safely on the surface , leaving its portion uncertain . It was , though , able to send 600 M of telemetry data while it was descend to its parent spacecraft , the Trace Gas Orbiter ( TGO ) , which successfully entered orbit around Mars yesterday .
In a printing press conference this morning , ESA revealed finding from this datum . The landing was supposed to occur in stages , with Schiaparelli give-up the ghost through the atmosphere , then deploying a parachute , and finally using thrusters to mildly shore on the ground .
According to the data point , though , it seem something went wrong during or after the chute stage . For starters , the parachute come along to have been jettisoned too early . The spacecraft was then suppose to fire its thrusters for 30 seconds on its approach to the ground , but they only fire for 3 to 4 seconds .
“ The time was much shorter than we were expect , ” Andrea Accomazzo , ESA Spacecraft Operations Manager , said at the press group discussion .
This was how the landing place was supposed to play out . ESA / ATG medialab
The signal from the lander was lost about 50 arcsecond before it was scheduled to concern down , but the lander was still communicating for 19 seconds after its thrusters turned off too early . This would evoke that the lander may have gone into freefall and crash landed .
We do n’t know for sure at the instant , and ESA has say they will be proceed to analyse data over the next few twenty-four hours . It may be weeks before we have a clear pic of what fall out .
But Schiaparelli only has enough battery power to last at most 12 Martian days ( 40 minutes longer than an Earth day ) . Repeated effort are endure to be made to contact it on the control surface , but right now , it does n’t look too good .
On the plus side , with the TGO in orbit , ESA can now set about the preliminary point of the ExoMars mission , studying methane in the Martian atmosphere . TGO will also assist as a relay planet for the rover in 2021 , although with this trial landing count like a nonstarter , the chance of that rover landing being successful will likely be scrutinise .
This attempted landing highlight how arduous missions to Mars are . More than one-half have failed , let in ESA ’s Beagle 2 lander in 2003 . Whether Schiaparelli will also be give that unwanted honor remains to be envision .
