ESA - Robotic Exploration of Mars

13 November 2019

In June, NASA's Curiosity rover reported the highest burst of methane recorded yet, but neither ESA's Mars Express nor the ExoMars Trace Gas Orbiter recorded any signs of the illusive gas, despite flying over the same location at a similar time.

15 October 2019

Positive steps towards solving the problems discovered with the ExoMars mission parachutes have been taken in the last month to keep on track for the July-August 2020 launch window.

27 August 2019The Rosalind Franklin ExoMars rover has completed its construction activities in the UK and will now depart to France for testing under the conditions of the Red Planet's environment.

20 August 2019The full suite of scientific instruments, including cameras that will give us our eyes on Mars, the drill that will retrieve pristine soil samples from below the surface, and the onboard laboratory that will seek out signs of life are all installed on the ExoMars rover.

12 August 2019As the second ExoMars mission, comprising a rover and surface science platform, progresses towards launch next year, teams continue to troubleshoot the parachute design following an unsuccessful high-altitude drop test last week.

22 July 2019An ambitious instrument for ESA's ExoMars 2020 mission has passed its testing in conditions resembling those on the Red Planet. It will now be transported to Russia for its acceptance review, followed by integration onto the Kazachok Surface Platform, scheduled for launch this time next year.

28 June 2019The full parachute system that will help deliver the ExoMars rover and a surface science platform to the martian surface has completed a full-scale high-altitude deployment sequence test, although unexpected damage to the main parachutes occurred.

1 February 2018There's a nice update today from Spacecraft Operations Engineer Armelle Hubault, working on the ExoMars TGO flight control team at ESOC. This graphic gives a very concise visualisation of the fantastic progress we’ve made with aerobraking to date.

6 December 2017On Friday, 17 November, the flight controllers at ESOC began operations to bring the spacecraft into a new phase of the on-going aerobraking campaign, marking the start of 'shorter' orbits. Here's a brief summary of progress to date.

16 November 2017We received an update from Robert Guilanya, flight dynamics lead for ExoMars/TGO, earlier today. He provided a short explanation of the Phobos orbit crossing that happened, for the first times, at 14:30 UTC and 20:00 UTC.

16 November 2017ESA's ExoMars/TGO orbiter – now conducting a year-long aerobraking campaign at Mars – crossed the orbit of Phobos today (spoiler alert: we avoided a collision!), marking a notable milestone in progress toward attaining its final, ca. 400-km altitude circular science orbit.

19 October 2017ExoMars has successfully performed a Flux Reduction Manoeuvre (FRM) for the first time. The manoeuvre was triggered by the excessive density of Mars' atmosphere, which had slowed the spacecraft above the limit the operations team normally allows.

14 March 2016Two NASA radios aboard the European Space Agency's Mars mission that launched today are engineered to provide communication relay service for rovers and landers on Mars. The twin Electra UHF (ultra-high frequency) radios are slated for a first in-flight test in about six weeks.

7 December 2015The UCL-made 'structural-thermal model' of the ExoMars PanCam instrument for the joint ESA-Roscosmos (Russian space agency) 2018 rover mission leaves UCL Mullard Space Science Laboratory (MSSL) today for Airbus UK in Stevenage.