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Phobos sample return mission enters development for 2024 launch
Japan's space agency has approved a robotic mission to retrieve a sample from the Martian moon Phobos for return to Earth to begin full development for a planned launch in 2024, officials said Thursday.
The Martian Moon eXploration, or MMX, spacecraft will attempt to return the first specimens from Phobos for analysis in laboratories on Earth, where scientists hope to trace the origins of the Martian moons to determine whether they were asteroids captured by Mars, or if they formed out of rocky debris generated from an ancient impact on Mars.
[...] The probe will land on Phobos and snare at least 10 grams, or about a third of an ounce, of material from the moon's surface using a coring collection system before taking off again. MMX will also release a German-French rover to explore the terrain and chemical composition of Phobos for roughly three months.
MMX will perform several close flybys of Deimos, the smaller of Mars's two moons, before departing the orbit of Mars in 2028 on a course back to Earth, where a sample return carrier will re-enter the atmosphere and land containing specimens gathered at Phobos. The MMX spacecraft's return to Earth in 2029 would complete the first round-trip voyage to Mars and back, JAXA said.
Phobos (moon). The Fobos-Grunt mission was intended to retrieve a sample from Phobos, but it failed to escape Earth's orbit and was destroyed in an uncontrolled re-entry in 2012.
Also at Popular Mechanics and The Verge.
(Score: 2) by legont on Sunday February 23 2020, @06:02PM (3 children)
Fobos-Grunt 2 mission is scheduled for the same 2022-25 window (currently for 2025 launch) http://www.russianspaceweb.com/phobos_grunt2.html [russianspaceweb.com]
"Wealth is the relentless enemy of understanding" - John Kenneth Galbraith.
(Score: 2) by legont on Sunday February 23 2020, @06:12PM
Perhaps interesting to mention the two versions of the reasons for failure of the first mission. The official one was ultrahigh-energy cosmic rays. The unofficial was a bug - summer savings time was set/not set. Regardless of opinions, Russia stopped doing time adjustments (before she was trying to match the US).
"Wealth is the relentless enemy of understanding" - John Kenneth Galbraith.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Sunday February 23 2020, @07:46PM (1 child)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fobos-Grunt#Repeat_mission [wikipedia.org]
Has there been a firm commitment yet?
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(Score: 2) by legont on Monday February 24 2020, @02:18AM
I don't think so. It appears that money was allocated, but no exact timeline was set.
"Wealth is the relentless enemy of understanding" - John Kenneth Galbraith.