Phobos-Grunt - Poss Reentry Jan 2010

[nev47]

thats if they cant get it to fire up. you can track it on heavens above

[nev47]

sorry should of been jan2012

The world's telescopes are still trying to contact a Russian space probe meant to visit the Martian moon Phobos, which has been stuck in Earth orbit since its launch on 8 November.

For reasons that are still unclear, the spacecraft never made two engine firings that were supposed to send it on its way to Mars after reaching Earth orbit. Also stranded is a Chinese Mars orbiter called Yinghuo-1, which was supposed to hitch a ride on Phobos-Grunt to the Red Planet.

Within hours of reaching Earth orbit, Phobos-Grunt was supposed to switch from using the sun to orient itself to navigating by the stars, then fire its engines to leave Earth orbit.

The failure to fire the engine is suspected to be due to communication difficulties between the star sensor and Phobos-Grunt's computer, says Francis Rocard of the French space agency CNES, which supplied some of the mission's instruments.

[Pavel]

It seems next failure of Roskosmos. In spite of everything I hope that situation will improve with use.