NASA lost contact with the Mars orbiter

During routine operations on December 6, NASA’s Deep Space Network (DSN) lost contact with Maven as it flew behind Mars. The tracking system predicted this type of signal loss, which occurs when distant spacecraft are obscured by celestial bodies, and would typically reestablish connection afterward. However, when Maven was expected to reappear from the far side of the red planet, DSN still could not receive the signal.

“The spacecraft teams and operations teams are investigating the incident to resolve it,” NASA said on December 9.

Data from Maven shows that before disappearing behind Mars, it was still flying in a normal orbit and the onboard systems were still in a stable state. If Maven’s orbit is not affected by the factor that caused the communication loss, NASA and the DSN operations team can continue efforts to send signals to the spacecraft according to the predicted orbit, and seek to determine the cause and next solution.

The Maven spacecraft launched into space on a ULA Atlas V rocket in November 2013, carrying equipment to measure how the Martian atmosphere develops and interacts with the solar wind. 10 months later, the spacecraft reached Mars orbit and has remained there for more than a decade. Scientists later concluded that the Sun was the cause of Mars losing most of its atmosphere into space, turning it from a warm, wet world into the cold, arid place it is today.

Maven is not NASA’s longest-running Mars orbiter. The agency currently has two other orbiters: MRO, launched in 2005, and Mars Odyssey launched in 2001.

In addition to scientific research, Maven is also an important communication link with several robots on the surface of Mars. It coordinates with MRO and Mars Odyssey (NASA), Mars Express and TGO (European Space Agency ESA) spacecraft to relay communications to rovers such as Perseverance and Curiosity (NASA).