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Mars Climate Orbiter
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The Mars Climate Orbiter mission was the first half of
the Mars Polar Lander mission. The two missions were to study the
Martian weather, climate, and water and carbon dioxide budget, in order
to understand the reservoirs, behavior, and atmospheric role of
volatiles and to search for evidence of long-term and episodic climate
changes. The Mars Climate Orbiter was destroyed when a navigation error
caused it to miss its target altiude at Mars by 80 to 90 km, instead
entering the martian atmosphere at an altitude of 57 km during the
orbit insertion manuever. This may have contributed to the loss of
the Mars Polar Lander which was relying on this spacecraft for
communications relays to Earth.
Mission Timeline
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| Last Updated on December 15, 2001 Karen. Meech, Institute for Astronomy, UH meech@ifa.hawaii.edu |
