What effect will the failure of the Russian rocket have on the mission to Mars?
The Mars 96 failure had little direct impact on the U.S. program. We lost two small instruments that were to measure the chemistry of the surface. But the loss of science for the earth’s Mars exploration is severe. There were 20 instruments on the orbiter plus two small landers and two penetrators, so it would have been a very informative mission if it had succeeded. There was a meeting last week of all the countries involved in exploring Mars to talk about how to recover the Mars 96 science. The ability of the Russians to fly another mission is very unclear, but many countries will offer instruments to fly on future U.S. missions, if we can accomodate them. –Donna Shirley, Mars Exploration Program Manager Back to the top of the page.
