Launched 2025
Active missionThe Escape and Plasma Acceleration and Dynamics Explorers (EscaPADE) are a dual-spacecraft mission to study ion and sputtered escape from Mars. EscaPADE is part of the NASA Small Innovative Missions for Planetary Exploration (SIMPLEx) program. Each identical spacecraft, named "Blue" and "Gold", has a dry mass of 209 kg and a fully fueled mass of 535 kg. It launched on Nov. 13, 2025 into a loiter orbit around Earth's Lagrange point 2 and will use Earth's gravity in the fall of 2026 to slingshot toward Mars; NASA's mission page, fetched on 2026-09-02, lists it as an Active Mission.
- Agency
- National Aeronautics and Space Administration
- Destination
- Mars
- Trajectory
- Trajectory unavailable
Launched 2024
Active missionNASA mission launched on 14 October 2024 and designed to go into an orbit around Jupiter that will allow multiple close flybys of its moon Europa, to determine whether Europa has conditions suitable to support life. It is taking a Mars Earth Gravity Assist trajectory whose Mars assist was flown on 1 March 2025; NASA's mission page calls it an Active Mission and gives an arrival at Jupiter in April 2030, after which it is to conduct 49 close flybys of Europa; NSSDCA's page adds that it will also fly by Ganymede and Callisto as part of its orbit-shaping maneuvers.
- Agency
- NASA
- Destination
- Jupiter · Mars
- Trajectory
- Trajectory unavailable
Launched 2023
Active missionNASA's Psyche mission launched on a SpaceX Falcon Heavy from Kennedy Space Center on 13 October 2023 to study the metal-rich asteroid Psyche in the main asteroid belt. Its cruise included a Mars gravity assist on 15 May 2026, and NASA says it will arrive at Psyche in August 2029.
- Agency
- NASA
- Destination
- Psyche · Mars
- Trajectory
- Trajectory unavailable
Launched 2020
Active missionNASA's active Mars 2020 mission operates the Perseverance rover in Jezero Crater, searching for signs of ancient microbial life and caching rock and regolith samples.
- Agency
- NASA · JPL
- Destination
- Mars
- Trajectory
- Trajectory unavailable
- Rover
- Technology Demonstrator
Launched 2020
Active missionTianwen 1 (formerly Huoxing 1) is a Chinese Mars mission comprising a lander/rover and orbiter that launched on 23 July 2020 and reaches Mars in February 2021. The scientific objectives of the mission are to study martian topography and geology, characterize the soil and its water-ice content, determine the composition of the surface material, profile the martian ionosphere, climate, and environment, and constrain the gravity and magnetic fields and the interior structure. The lander and the Zhurong rover separated from the orbiter and made a landing in the Utopia Planitia region on 14 May 2021. No page fetched for this record states the mission's state later than the August 2025 capture it cites.
- Agency
- China National Space Administration
- Destination
- Mars
- Trajectory
- Trajectory unavailable
Launched 2020
Active missionThe Emirates Mars Mission, or "Hope" (Al-Amal) Mars orbiter mission launched from Tanegashima Space Center at 21:58:14 UT on 19 July 2020. Built by the United Arab Emirates, the mission will orbit Mars and study the dynamics of the martian atmosphere and its interaction with outer space and the solar wind. It entered an elliptical, roughly 22000 x 44000 km orbit on 9 February 2021. Two years of science operations are planned, beginning in May 2021, with a possibility of a two-year extension to do more science into 2025, and no page fetched for this record states whether operations have ended.
- Agency
- United Arab Emirates
- Destination
- Mars
- Trajectory
- Trajectory unavailable
Launched 2018
Completed · SuccessInSight (Interior Exploration using Seismic Investigations, Geodesy and Heat Transport) is a NASA Discovery mission which landed on Mars in November 2018 and conduct surface observations until December 2022. The surface station carries cameras, X-band transponder, seismic and heat flow instruments designed with the scientific goals of understanding the formation and evolution of terrestrial planets through investigation of the interior structure and processes of Mars and to determine the present level of tectonic activity and meteorite impact rate on Mars. The last transmission was received on 15 December 2022 and the mission was declared over on 21 December 2022.
- Agency
- National Aeronautics and Space Administration
- Destination
- Mars
- Trajectory
- Trajectory unavailable
Launched 2018
Completed · SuccessMarCO (Mars Cube One) is a two spacecraft mission to accompany the InSight Mars lander to provide real-time data relay during the landing phase, as the MRO, MAVEN, and Mars Odyssey orbiters will not be in position to receive InSight data. The MarCO space craft were built at the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory to the 6U-cubesats form factor. JPL's page describes MarCO-A and B as the first and second interplanetary CubeSats designed to monitor InSight for a short period around landing, and gives the mission's status as Past.
- Agency
- JPL
- Destination
- Mars
- Trajectory
- Trajectory unavailable
- Technology Demonstrator
- Flyby
Launched 2016
Active missionThe ExoMars 2016 mission comprises two spacecraft, an orbiter and a lander, launched together in March 2016. The Trace Gas Orbiter will detect and monitor trace gases in the martian atmosphere from an approximately 400 km orbit. The lander, Schiaparelli, is an entry, descent, and landing demonstrator module designed to test out technologies necessary for future lander missions. ExoMars is a European Space Agency program undertaken in conjunction with Roscosmos. An anomaly in the navigation system caused Schiaparelli to free fall the final 3.7 km, which it could not survive. ESA's account of the May 2024 solar superstorm at Mars, fetched on 2026-09-02, describes the Trace Gas Orbiter as one of its two Mars orbiters in the present tense.
- Agency
- ESA · Roscosmos
- Destination
- Mars
- Trajectory
- Trajectory unavailable
- Orbiter
- Lander
- Technology Demonstrator
Launched 2013
Completed · SuccessThe Mars Atmosphere and Volatile EvolutioN (MAVEN) mission is designed to explore Mars' upper atmosphere and ionosphere, and interactions with the solar wind, specifically to determine the loss of volatile compounds to space through time and how it has affected the history of Mars' atmosphere and climate. MAVEN is part of NASA's Mars Scout program. NASA's mission page, fetched on 2026-09-02, records that the mission ended after more than 11 years in orbit following an unexpected loss of signal on 6 December 2025, with end of mission declared June 3, 2026.
- Agency
- National Aeronautics and Space Administration
- Destination
- Mars
- Trajectory
- Trajectory unavailable
Launched 2013
Completed · SuccessThe Mars Orbiter Mission (MOM) or Mangalyaan (Hindi for "Mars Craft") is designed to study Mars from orbit. The scientific objectives are to explore Mars' surface features, morphology, mineralogy, and atmosphere, and it carries five scientific instruments. It was nominally planned to spend 6-10 months orbiting and making measurements at Mars; the orbiter remained operational until April 2022 when comunications were lost, probably due to depletio of propellant for attitude control.
- Agency
- Indian Space Research Organization
- Destination
- Mars
- Trajectory
- Trajectory unavailable
Launched 2011
Active missionThe Mars Science Laboratory (MSL), nicknamed Curiosity, is a large rover with the objective of exploring the martian environment as a former or current habitat for life. The rover is a six wheeled vehicle approximately 2.8 meters in length with a mass of over 750 kg, powered by a radioisotope thermoelectric generator. It landed in Gale Crater on 6 August 2012, a site chosen for its potential as a former or current habitat for life. NASA's mission page, fetched on 2026-09-02, lists it as an Active Mission.
- Agency
- National Aeronautics and Space Administration
- Destination
- Mars
- Trajectory
- Trajectory unavailable
Launched 2011
Failed · FailurePhobos-Grunt (alternatively Fobos-Grunt) was a Russian mission designed to land on the martian moon Phobos and return a sample to Earth. The primary scientific objective was to analyze the sample on Earth to understand the origin and reconstruct the history of Phobos. It was launched with a Chinese Mars orbiter mission, Yinghuo-1. The spacecraft did not perform its scheduled burn to begin its trajectory to Mars and could not leave Earth orbit. It re-entered Earth's atmosphere on 15 January 2012.
- Agency
- Russia
- Destination
- Mars
- Trajectory
- Trajectory unavailable
Launched 2011
Failed · FailureThe Yinghuo-1 ("Firefly") mission is a Chinese Mars orbiter scheduled to launch in tandem with the Russian Phobos-Grunt mission in November 2011. The primary scientific objectives of the mission are to study martian space environmental structure, plasma distribution and other characteristics; the solar wind-atmosphere coupling and energy deposition processes, martian ion escape processes and mechanisms, the regional gravity field of Mars, and to perform martian and Phobos surface imaging. Yinghuo-1 was stacked on a common booster below Phobos-Grunt, and the Phobos-Grunt/Yinghuo-1 spacecraft did not perform its scheduled burn to begin its trajectory to Mars and could not leave Earth orbit.
- Agency
- China National Space Administration
- Destination
- Mars
- Trajectory
- Trajectory unavailable
Launched 2007
Completed · SuccessNASA's Dawn orbited asteroid Vesta and dwarf planet Ceres after a Mars gravity assist, becoming the first spacecraft to orbit two extraterrestrial destinations. Launched in 2007, it completed its successful mission in 2018 after exhausting its hydrazine.
- Agency
- NASA · JPL
- Destination
- Vesta · Ceres · Mars
- Trajectory
- Trajectory unavailable
Launched 2007
Completed · SuccessPhoenix launched on 04 August 2007 on a Delta II 7925 from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, and its 681 million km heliocentric cruise to Mars took approximately 10 months. At 1 km altitude the parachute was released and a powered descent and soft-landing was achieved using a pulsed propulsion system with 8 thrusters, which turned off when footpad sensors detected touchdown. The landing site is in the north polar region between 65 and 72 degrees N, a relatively boulder-free area with a high ratio of ice to rock. Communications were maintained through the relays on the orbiting Mars spacecraft Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter and Mars Express throughout the descent. As the summer ended the mission had less solar energy to operate and made its last transmission on 02 November 2008 before power was depleted.
- Agency
- National Aeronautics and Space Administration
- Destination
- Mars
- Trajectory
- Trajectory unavailable
Launched 2005
Active missionNASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter blasted off from Cape Canaveral in 2005, on a search for evidence that water persisted on the surface of Mars for long periods of time. While other Mars missions have shown that water flowed across the surface in Mars' history, it remains a mystery whether water was ever around long enough to provide a habitat for life. The cruise to Mars took seven months and included checkouts, calibrations, navigation, and five trajectory correction maneuvers; the orbiter reached Mars and went into orbit on 10 March 2006, and aerobraking was used over the next six months to lower the orbit to the 255 x 320 km science orbit. NASA's mission page lists it as an active mission with a mission duration of 2006 - ongoing.
- Agency
- National Aeronautics and Space Administration
- Destination
- Mars
- Trajectory
- Trajectory unavailable
Launched 2004
Completed · SuccessESA's Rosetta was the first mission to rendezvous with a comet, the first to follow one around the Sun, and the first to deploy a lander to a comet's surface. Launched 2 March 2004 on an Ariane 5 G+ from Kourou, it used three Earth gravity assists and one Mars gravity assist, flew past asteroids Steins and Lutetia, hibernated for 31 months, and arrived at Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko on 6 August 2014. It released the Philae lander on 12 November 2014 and ended with a controlled descent onto the comet on 30 September 2016.
- Agency
- ESA · DLR · CNES
- Destination
- 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko · Earth · Mars · 2867 Steins · 21 Lutetia
- Trajectory
- Precise trajectory
Launched 2003
Completed · SuccessOpportunity (Mars Exploration Rover B or MER-1) is one of two rovers launched to Mars in mid-2003. The scientific goals of the rover missions are to gather data to help determine if life ever arose on Mars, characterize the climate of Mars, characterize the geology of Mars, and prepare for human exploration of Mars. It came to rest in a 20 m diameter crater at Terra Meridiani, also known as the Hematite Site because it displays evidence of coarse-grained hematite, an iron-rich mineral which typically forms in water. Opportunity explored Meridiani Terra, returning images and data from its scientific instruments, for over 14 years, and the final communication from the rover was received on 10 June 2018.
- Agency
- National Aeronautics and Space Administration
- Destination
- Mars
- Trajectory
- Trajectory unavailable
Launched 2003
Completed · SuccessThe Spirit rover (Mars Exploration Rover A or MER-2) is one of two rovers launched to Mars in mid-2003. The scientific goals of the rover missions are to gather data to help determine if life ever arose on Mars, characterize the climate of Mars, characterize the geology of Mars, and prepare for human exploration of Mars. Spirit landed in Gusev Crater on 4 January 2004 and drove off the platform onto the surface on 15 January. It explored Gusev crater, taking images and making scientific measurements, although it lost the use of one of its six wheels; on 23 April 2009 the rover broke through a thin crust into a pocket of sand that severely limited its mobility, and by 1 May it could no longer move at all. The last transmission from Spirit occurred on 22 March 2010, after the rover had travelled a total of 7.73 km over a period of 6 years, 2 months.
- Agency
- National Aeronautics and Space Administration
- Destination
- Mars
- Trajectory
- Trajectory unavailable
Launched 2003
Active missionMars Express is a European Space Agency (ESA) mission to Mars. It consists of an orbiter, the Mars Express Orbiter, and a lander, Beagle 2. The scientific objectives of the orbiter are to obtain global high-resolution photo-geology, mineralogical mapping and mapping of the atmospheric composition, and to study the subsurface structure, the global atmospheric circulation, and the interaction between the atmosphere and the subsurface and the interplanetary medium. The orbiter fired its main engine for 37 minutes on 25 December 2003 and went into a highly elliptical capture orbit, later adjusted to a near-polar orbit with a period of 7.5 hours. Beagle 2 was released on 19 December, no signals were received following its scheduled landing, and the lander was declared lost. ESA's Mars Express page, fetched on 2026-09-02, gives the mission's status as In operation.
- Agency
- ESA
- Destination
- Mars
- Trajectory
- Trajectory unavailable
Launched 2001
Active missionThe 2001 Mars Odyssey is the remaining part of the Mars Surveyor 2001 Project, which originally consisted of two separately launched missions, the Mars Surveyor 2001 Orbiter and the Mars Surveyor 2001 Lander; the lander spacecraft was cancelled as part of the reorganization of the Mars Exploration Program at NASA. The orbiter's objective is a detailed mineralogical analysis of the planet's surface from orbit and measurement of the radiation environment, and it also acts as a communications relay for missions on the surface. It reached Mars on 24 October 2001 and used aerobraking to settle into an approximately 400 x 400 km polar science orbit. NASA's mission page lists it as an active mission with a mission duration of 2001 - ongoing.
- Agency
- NASA-Office of Space Science
- Destination
- Mars
- Trajectory
- Trajectory unavailable
Launched 1999
Lost · FailureA pair of small probes, the Deep Space 2 Mars Microprobes, attached to the Mars Polar Lander spacecraft and to be deployed to fall and penetrate beneath the martian surface when the spacecraft reached Mars. NSSDCA gives Deep Space 2 an entry of its own while describing it as a penetrator mission flying aboard the Mars Polar Lander, and NSSDCA's chronology of Mars exploration classifies it Attempted Mars Penetrators. The two 3.5 kg microprobes were to be dropped from the cruise stage into the martian atmosphere about 18 seconds after the cruise stage was jettisoned, targeted at the southern polar layered terrain; because contact with Mars Polar Lander was lost before atmospheric entry, it is not known whether any of that took place as designed.
- Agency
- NASA-Office of Space Science
- Destination
- Mars
- Trajectory
- Trajectory unavailable
Launched 1999
Lost · FailureThe Mars Surveyor '98 program is comprised of two spacecraft launched separately, the Mars Climate Orbiter and the Mars Polar Lander, designed 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 Polar Lander was to touch down on the southern polar layered terrain, between 73 S and 76 S, less than 1000 km from the south pole, near the edge of the carbon dioxide ice cap in Mars' late southern spring. The last telemetry from Mars Polar Lander was sent just prior to atmospheric entry on 3 December 1999. No further signals have been received from the lander, the cause of this loss of communication is not known.
- Agency
- NASA-Office of Space Science
- Destination
- Mars
- Trajectory
- Trajectory unavailable
Launched 1998
Lost · FailureNASA's Mars Climate Orbiter was to be the first interplanetary weather satellite at Mars and a communications relay for the Mars Polar Lander. Launched 11 December 1998 on a Delta II from Cape Canaveral, it was lost on 23 September 1999 during the Mars Orbit Insertion burn. The Mishap Investigation Board found the root cause was the failure to use metric units in a ground software file, "Small Forces", used in trajectory models: thruster impulse data was delivered in pound-seconds instead of the specified newton-seconds, low by a factor of 4.45, driving the spacecraft roughly 170 km lower than planned at Mars arrival.
- Agency
- NASA · JPL
- Destination
- Mars
- Trajectory
- Trajectory unavailable
Launched 1998
Failed · FailureNozomi (Japanese for Hope and known before launch as Planet-B) was planned as a Mars orbiting aeronomy mission designed to study the martian upper atmosphere and its interaction with the solar wind and to develop technologies for use in future planetary missions. A malfunctioning valve during an Earth swingby resulted in a loss of fuel and left the spacecraft with insufficient acceleration to reach its planned trajectory, and solar flares later damaged its communications and power systems. Efforts to put the Nozomi spacecraft into martian orbit have been abandoned: an attempt to fire thrusters to orient the craft for a Mars orbit insertion burn failed on December 9, the smaller thrusters were successfully fired, and Nozomi flew past Mars at a distance of 1000 km on 14 December and went into a heliocentric orbit with a period of roughly two years.
- Agency
- Institute of Space and Aeronautical Science, U of Tokyo
- Destination
- Mars · Earth · Moon
- Trajectory
- Trajectory unavailable
Launched 1996
Completed · SuccessThe Mars Pathfinder was the second of NASA's low-cost planetary Discovery missions to be launched. The mission consists of a stationary lander and a surface rover, and had the primary objective of demonstrating the feasibility of low-cost landings on and exploration of the Martian surface. The spacecraft entered the Martian atmosphere on 4 July 1997 directly from its approach hyperbola at about 7300 m/s without going into orbit around the planet, and the airbag-encased lander bounced about 12 meters into the air, bouncing at least another 15 times and rolling before coming to rest. Images were taken and experiments performed by the lander and rover until 27 September 1997 when communications were lost for unknown reasons. The lander has been named the Sagan Memorial Station.
- Agency
- NASA-Office of Space Science
- Destination
- Mars
- Trajectory
- Trajectory unavailable
Launched 1996
Failed · FailureThe Russian Mars 96 mission was designed to send an orbiter, two small autonomous stations, and two surface penetrators to Mars to investigate the evolution and contemporary physics of the planet by studying the physical and chemical processes which took place in the past and which currently take place. The Mars 96 spacecraft was launched into Earth orbit, but failed to achieve insertion into Mars cruise trajectory and re-entered the Earth's atmosphere at about 00:45 to 01:30 UT on 17 November 1996 and crashed within a presumed 320 km by 80 km area which includes parts of the Pacific Ocean, Chile, and Bolivia. The cause of the crash is not known.
- Agency
- Russian Space Agency
- Destination
- Mars
- Trajectory
- Trajectory unavailable
Launched 1996
Completed · SuccessThe Mars Global Surveyor (MGS) orbited Mars over a seven year period and collected data on the surface morphology, topography, composition, gravity, atmospheric dynamics, and magnetic field, to be used to investigate the surface processes, geology, distribution of material, internal properties, evolution of the magnetic field, and the weather and climate of Mars. It was inserted into an elliptical capture orbit in September 1997, and because one of the solar panels failed to latch properly when it was deployed, a new aerobraking schedule was employed which involved slower aerobraking putting less pressure on the solar panels. The primary mission lasted one martian year through January 2001, an extended mission took place until April 2002, and further extensions were added until contact with the spacecraft was lost on 2 November 2006.
- Agency
- NASA-Office of Space Science
- Destination
- Mars
- Trajectory
- Trajectory unavailable
Launched 1992
Lost · FailureMars Observer, the first of the Observer series of planetary missions, was designed to study the geoscience and climate of Mars. Its primary science objectives were to determine the global elemental and mineralogical character of the surface material, define globally the topography and gravitational field, establish the nature of the Martian magnetic field, determine the distribution and abundance of volatiles and dust over a seasonal cycle, and explore the structure and circulation of the atmosphere. Contact with Mars Observer was lost on August 21, 1993, three days before scheduled orbit insertion, for unknown reasons and has not been re-established; it is not known whether the spacecraft was able to follow its automatic programming and go into Mars orbit or if it flew by Mars and is now in a heliocentric orbit. Although none of the primary objectives of the mission were achieved, cruise mode data were collected up to loss of contact.
- Agency
- NASA-Office of Space Science Applications · Centre National d'Etudes Spatiales · Russian Space Agency
- Destination
- Mars
- Trajectory
- Trajectory unavailable
Launched 1988
Partial Success · Partial SuccessOne of two 1F spacecraft launched in July 1988, and the one that reached Mars. Phobos 2 operated nominally throughout its cruise and Mars orbital insertion phases, gathering data on the Sun, interplanetary medium, Mars, and Phobos. Shortly before the final phase of the mission, during which the spacecraft was to approach within 50 m of Phobos' surface and release two landers, one a mobile hopper, the other a stationary platform, contact with Phobos 2 was lost. The mission ended when the spacecraft signal failed to be successfully reacquired on 27 March 1989. The cause of the failure was determined to be a malfunction of the on-board computer.
- Agency
- Institut Kosmicheskich Issledovaniy
- Destination
- Mars
- Trajectory
- Trajectory unavailable
Launched 1988
Lost · FailureOne of two 1F spacecraft launched in July 1988, the next-generation in the Venera-type planetary missions, succeeding those last used during the Vega 1 and 2 missions to comet P/Halley. The objectives of the Phobos missions were to conduct studies of the interplanetary environment, perform observations of the Sun, characterize the plasma environment in the Martian vicinity, conduct surface and atmospheric studies of Mars, and study the surface composition of the Martian satellite Phobos. Phobos 1 operated nominally until an expected communications session failed to occur. The failure of controllers to regain contact with the spacecraft was traced to an error in the software uploaded on 29/30 August which had deactivated the attitude thrusters. This resulted in a loss of lock on the Sun, resulting in the spacecraft orienting the solar arrays away from the Sun, thus depleting the batteries.
- Agency
- Institut Kosmicheskich Issledovaniy
- Destination
- Mars
- Trajectory
- Trajectory unavailable
Launched 1975
Completed · SuccessThe second of the two spacecraft of NASA's Viking project, an orbiter and a lander launched on 9 September 1975. Its landing site was selected from images returned by both Viking orbiters, and the Viking 2 Lander touched down about 200 km west of the crater Mie in Utopia Planitia. The orbiter developed a leak in its propulsion system that vented its attitude control gas and was turned off on 25 July 1978 after returning almost 16,000 images in 706 orbits around Mars; the lander operated on the surface for 1281 Mars days and was turned off on April 11, 1980 when its batteries failed.
- Agency
- NASA-Office of Space Science Applications
- Destination
- Mars
- Trajectory
- Trajectory unavailable
Launched 1975
Completed · SuccessThe first of the two spacecraft of NASA's Viking project, each consisting of an orbiter and a lander. After orbiting Mars and returning images used for landing site selection, the orbiter and lander detached and the lander entered the martian atmosphere and soft-landed at the selected site, while the orbiter continued imaging and other scientific operations from orbit. The Viking 1 Lander touched down in western Chryse Planitia and operated until 13 November 1982 when contact was lost; it was named the Thomas Mutch Memorial Station in January 1981 in honor of the original leader of the Viking imaging team. Viking 1 Orbiter operations were terminated on 17 August 1980 after 1485 orbits. The total cost of the Viking project was roughly one billion dollars.
- Agency
- NASA-Office of Space Science Applications
- Destination
- Mars
- Trajectory
- Trajectory unavailable
Launched 1973
Failed · FailureThe last of the four Soviet spacecraft launched towards Mars in July and August of 1973. The Mars 7 interplanetary station was intended to be a Mars lander, consisting of a flyby bus and a descent module designed to enter the martian atmosphere and make in-situ studies of the atmosphere and surface, but a malfunction on board caused the lander to miss the planet. Due to a problem in the operation of one of the onboard systems the landing probe separated prematurely, four hours before encounter, and missed the planet by 1300 km; the lander and bus continued on into heliocentric orbits.
- Agency
- U.S.S.R
- Destination
- Mars
- Trajectory
- Trajectory unavailable
Launched 1973
Partial Success · Partial SuccessThe third of the four Soviet spacecraft launched towards Mars in July and August of 1973. The Mars 6 interplanetary station consisted of a flyby bus and an attached descent module; the descent module separated from the bus on reaching Mars and was designed to enter the martian atmosphere and make in-situ studies of the Mars atmosphere and surface. Contact with the descent module was lost in direct proximity to the surface, probably either when the retrorockets fired or when it hit the surface. The descent module transmitted 224 seconds of data before transmissions ceased, which NSSDCA records as the first data returned from the atmosphere of Mars, although much of it was unreadable due to a flaw in a computer chip which led to degradation of the system during its journey to Mars.
- Agency
- U.S.S.R
- Destination
- Mars
- Trajectory
- Trajectory unavailable
Launched 1973
Partial Success · Partial SuccessThe second of the four Soviet spacecraft launched towards Mars in July and August of 1973. The Mars 5 automatic station was designed to orbit Mars and return information on the composition, structure and properties of the martian atmosphere and surface, and was also designed to act as a communications link to the Mars 6 and 7 landers. The orbiter operated only a few days and returned atmospheric data and images of a small portion of the martian southern hemisphere: it collected data for 22 orbits until a loss of pressurization in the transmitter housing ended the mission, returning about 60 images over a nine day period.
- Agency
- U.S.S.R
- Destination
- Mars
- Trajectory
- Trajectory unavailable
Launched 1973
Partial Success · Partial SuccessThe first of the associated group of four Soviet spacecraft, Mars 4, 5, 6 and 7, launched towards Mars in July and August of 1973. The Mars 4 automatic station was intended to be a Mars orbiter mission, very similar in design and intended mission to the Mars 5 orbiter launched 4 days later. Due to a flaw in a transistor which resulted in degradation of the computer chip during the voyage to Mars, the retro-rockets never fired to slow the craft into Mars orbit, and Mars 4 flew by the planet instead. It returned one swath of pictures and some radio occultation data which NSSDCA records as the first detection of the nightside ionosphere on Mars, and continued to return interplanetary data from solar orbit after the flyby.
- Agency
- U.S.S.R
- Destination
- Mars
- Trajectory
- Trajectory unavailable
Launched 1971
Completed · SuccessThe Mariner Mars 71 mission was planned to consist of two spacecraft to orbit Mars on complementary missions, but due to the failure of Mariner 8 to launch properly, only one spacecraft was available. Mariner 9 combined mission objectives of both Mariner 8 (mapping 70 % of the Martian surface) and Mariner 9 (a study of temporal changes in the Martian atmosphere and on the Martian surface). NSSDCA records it as the first spacecraft to orbit another planet. Imaging was delayed by a global dust storm that began on 22 September 1971, and normal mapping operations began once the storm abated through November and December. A total of 54 billion bits of scientific data were returned, including 7329 images covering the entire planet, before the spacecraft was turned off on 27 October 1972.
- Agency
- NASA-Office of Space Science Applications
- Destination
- Mars
- Trajectory
- Trajectory unavailable
Launched 1971
Partial Success · Partial SuccessThe second of the two identical Mars 2 and Mars 3 spacecraft, each with a bus/orbiter module and an attached descent/lander module. The primary scientific objectives of the Mars 3 orbiter were to image the martian surface and clouds, determine the temperature on Mars, study the topography, composition and physical properties of the surface, measure properties of the atmosphere, monitor solar radiation, the solar wind and the interplanetary and martian magnetic fields, and act as a communications relay to send signals from the lander to Earth. Through aerodynamic braking, parachutes, and retro-rockets, the lander achieved a soft landing and began operations, but after 20 sec the instruments stopped working for unknown reasons. The orbiter had suffered a partial loss of fuel and reached a long 12 day, 19 hour period orbit instead of the planned 25 hour one.
- Agency
- U.S.S.R
- Destination
- Mars
- Trajectory
- Trajectory unavailable
Launched 1971
Partial Success · Partial SuccessThe Mars 2 and Mars 3 missions consisted of identical spacecraft, each with a bus/orbiter module and an attached descent/lander module. The primary scientific objectives of the Mars 2 orbiter were to image the martian surface and clouds, determine the temperature on Mars, study the topography, composition and physical properties of the surface, measure properties of the atmosphere, monitor the solar wind and the interplanetary and martian magnetic fields, and act as a communications relay to send signals from the lander to Earth. The descent module entered the martian atmosphere at a steeper angle than planned, the descent system malfunctioned and the lander crashed, delivering the Soviet Union coat of arms to the surface; the orbiter entered a 1380 x 24,940 km orbit and completed 362 orbits before the mission was announced complete on 22 August 1972.
- Agency
- U.S.S.R
- Destination
- Mars
- Trajectory
- Trajectory unavailable
Launched 1971
Failed · FailureA Soviet launch intended to be a Mars orbiting mission, presumably similar to the orbiter section of the later Mars 2 mission. NSSDCA records that it is widely believed this spacecraft was launched with the primary purpose of overtaking Mariner 8, which had been launched unsuccessfully two days earlier, and becoming the first Mars orbiter. The Proton booster successfully put the spacecraft into a low Earth parking orbit, but the Block D stage 4 failed to function due to a bad ignition timer setting, and the orbit decayed. Beginning in 1962, the name Cosmos was given to Soviet spacecraft which remained in Earth orbit, regardless of whether that was their intended final destination.
- Agency
- U.S.S.R
- Destination
- Mars
- Trajectory
- Trajectory unavailable
Launched 1971
Failed · FailureMariner-H, also commonly known as Mariner 8, was (along with Mariner 9) part of the Mariner Mars 71 project. It was intended to go into Mars orbit and return images and data: the project consisted of two spacecraft, Mariners H and I, each of which would be inserted into a Martian orbit and would perform a separate but complementary mission, orbiting Mars a minimum of 90 days and covering approximately 70 percent of the planetary surface. The Centaur upper stage began to oscillate in pitch and tumbled out of control, and the spacecraft fell into the Atlantic Ocean. Some of the objectives of the Mariner-H mission were successfully added to the Mariner-I (Mariner 9) mission profile.
- Agency
- NASA-Office of Space Science Applications
- Destination
- Mars
- Trajectory
- Trajectory unavailable
Launched 1969
Failed · FailureThe second of the two identical M-69 class probes launched in the spring of 1969, a Soviet Mars mission never officially announced but since identified as a planned orbiter. The nominal mission plan was the same as its twin's: put the spacecraft into a 1700 x 34,000 km capture orbit around Mars with an inclination of 40 degrees and a period of 24 hours, then lower the periapsis to 500 to 700 km for a nominal three month session of imaging and data collection from orbit. The first stage of the launcher failed almost immediately and the rocket impacted and exploded 41 seconds after liftoff approximately 3 km from the launch pad.
- Agency
- U.S.S.R
- Destination
- Mars
- Trajectory
- Trajectory unavailable
Launched 1969
Completed · SuccessThe second spacecraft of the dual-spacecraft Mariner 6 and 7 mission to Mars. The Mariner 6 and 7 spacecraft were identical, and NSSDCA records this one as launched on a direct-ascent trajectory 31 days after the launch of Mariner 6. Its imaging sequence was reprogrammed as a result of analysis of Mariner 6 images, calling for the spacecraft to go further south than originally planned, take more near-encounter pictures and collect more scientific data on the lighted side of Mars. At closest approach, 05:00:49 UT on 5 August 1969, Mariner 7 was 3430 km above the martian surface, and it returned 93 far encounter and 33 near encounter images.
- Agency
- NASA-Office of Space Science Applications
- Destination
- Mars
- Trajectory
- Trajectory unavailable
Launched 1969
Failed · FailureA Soviet Mars mission that was never officially announced but has since been identified as a planned orbiter, the first of two identical M-69 class probes launched in the spring of 1969. The nominal mission plan was to put the spacecraft into a 1700 x 34,000 km capture orbit around Mars with an inclination of 40 degrees and a period of 24 hours, then lower the periapsis to 500 to 700 km for a nominal three month session of imaging and data collection from orbit. After successful operation of the first two stages, the third stage of the launcher experienced a malfunction in a rotor bearing which caused the turbopump to catch fire; the engine shut down 438.66 seconds after launch and exploded.
- Agency
- U.S.S.R
- Destination
- Mars
- Trajectory
- Trajectory unavailable
Launched 1969
Completed · SuccessMariner 6 and 7 comprised a dual-spacecraft mission to Mars, the sixth and seventh missions in the Mariner series of spacecraft used for planetary exploration in the flyby mode; Mariner 6 was the first of the two to launch. The primary objectives were to study the surface and atmosphere of Mars during close flybys to establish the basis for future investigations, particularly those relevant to the search for extraterrestrial life, and to demonstrate and develop technologies required for future Mars missions. Mariner 6 also had the objective of providing experience and data which would be useful in programming the Mariner 7 encounter 5 days later. Closest approach occurred at 05:19:07 UT on 31 July 1969 at a distance of 3431 km from the martian surface, and the spacecraft returned 49 far encounter and 26 near encounter images of Mars.
- Agency
- NASA-Office of Space Science Applications
- Destination
- Mars
- Trajectory
- Trajectory unavailable
Launched 1964
Lost · Partial SuccessA Soviet automatic interplanetary station launched from a Tyazheliy Sputnik in Earth parking orbit towards Mars to test space-borne systems and to carry out scientific investigations, carrying a descent craft and the same instruments as the Mars 1 flyby spacecraft. It carried six experimental low-thrust electrojet plasma ion engines that served as actuators of the attitude control system, and NSSDCA records its electronic ion engines as successfully tested between 08 and 18 December 1964, the first successful firing of ion engines on an interplanetary mission. One solar panel failed to deploy until 15 December, too late for the crucial first mid-course maneuver, and communications were lost in early May 1965 before the spacecraft passed Mars on 6 August 1965.
- Agency
- U.S.S.R
- Destination
- Mars
- Trajectory
- Trajectory unavailable
Launched 1964
Completed · SuccessThe fourth in NASA's series of planetary flyby spacecraft, which NSSDCA records as the first successful flyby of the planet Mars, returning the first pictures of the martian surface and the first images of another planet ever returned from deep space. After 7.5 months of flight involving one midcourse maneuver, it passed Mars on 14 and 15 July 1965, taking 21 pictures plus 21 lines of a 22nd covering about 1% of the planet's surface, and returned 5.2 million bits of data in total. Communications with Mariner 4 were terminated on 21 December 1967.
- Agency
- NASA-Office of Space Science Applications
- Destination
- Mars
- Trajectory
- Trajectory unavailable
Launched 1964
Failed · FailureA NASA spacecraft designed to make scientific measurements in the vicinity of Mars and to obtain photographs of the planet's surface and transmit these to Earth, intended to encounter Mars after a 325-million mile journey in a little less than 8 months. A protective shield failed to eject after the spacecraft had passed through the atmosphere; none of the instrument sensors were uncovered, and the added weight prevented the spacecraft from attaining its prescribed Mars trajectory.
- Agency
- NASA-Office of Space Science Applications
- Destination
- Mars
- Trajectory
- Trajectory unavailable
Launched 1962
Failed · FailureAn attempted Soviet Mars lander mission. The SL-6/A-2-e launcher put the spacecraft and the attached booster upper stage into a 197 x 590 km Earth orbit with an inclination of 64.7 degrees; the complex broke up during the burn to transfer to Mars trajectory and five large pieces were tracked by the U.S. Ballistic Missile Early Warning System. The geocentric orbit of the presumed booster decayed on 25 December 1962 and the Mars spacecraft orbit decayed and it re-entered Earth's atmosphere on 19 January 1963.
- Agency
- U.S.S.R
- Destination
- Mars
- Trajectory
- Trajectory unavailable
Launched 1962
Lost · Partial SuccessA Soviet automatic interplanetary station launched with the intent of flying by Mars at a distance of about 11,000 km, designed to image the surface and return data on cosmic radiation, micrometeoroid impacts and Mars' magnetic field, radiation environment, atmospheric structure and possible organic compounds. NSSDCA records it as the first spacecraft to fly by Mars, although communications had been lost before it reached the planet: sixty-one radio transmissions returned a large amount of interplanetary data before contact ceased on 21 March 1963, and closest approach to Mars followed on 19 June 1963.
- Agency
- U.S.S.R
- Destination
- Mars
- Trajectory
- Trajectory unavailable
Launched 1962
Failed · FailureAn attempted Soviet Mars flyby mission, which NSSDCA describes as presumably similar to the Mars 1 mission launched 8 days later. The spacecraft and attached upper stage, with a total mass of 6500 kg, were launched by an SL-6 into a 180 x 485 km Earth parking orbit with an inclination of 64.9 degrees and either broke up as they were going into Earth orbit or had the upper stage explode in orbit during the burn to put the spacecraft into Mars trajectory. The spacecraft broke into many pieces, some of which apparently remained in Earth orbit for a few days.
- Agency
- U.S.S.R
- Destination
- Mars
- Trajectory
- Trajectory unavailable
Launched 1960
Failed · FailureAn intended Soviet Mars flyby mission lost during launch, which NSSDCA describes as either the Soviet Union's first or second attempt at a planetary probe, depending on whether Mars 1960A four days earlier was actually designed to go to Mars. 290 seconds after launch the third stage turbopumps were unable to develop enough pressure to commence ignition; Earth parking orbit was not achieved and the spacecraft fell back to Earth. The cause was believed to be a failed valve on the ground, which allowed kerosene to freeze so that it could not flow into the turbopump.
- Agency
- U.S.S.R
- Destination
- Mars
- Trajectory
- Trajectory unavailable
Launched 1960
Failed · FailureAn intended Soviet Mars flyby probe lost during launch. NSSDCA records that vibrations from the ignition of the second stage damaged the gyroscopic pitch control, causing the rocket to veer off-course; the emergency cutoff of engine procedure was instituted at 309.9 seconds after launch and the spacecraft reached an altitude of 120 km before reentry, eventually crashing in eastern Siberia. The same page records that the mission's identity is disputed: some Soviet scientists involved with the program claimed no knowledge of it, while V. G. Perminov, the leading designer of planetary spacecraft at the Lavochkin design bureau, states it was indeed intended for Mars and identical to Mars 1960B.
- Agency
- U.S.S.R
- Destination
- Mars
- Trajectory
- Trajectory unavailable