{"id":459886,"date":"2026-06-04T02:53:11","date_gmt":"2026-06-04T02:53:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/459886\/"},"modified":"2026-06-04T02:53:11","modified_gmt":"2026-06-04T02:53:11","slug":"its-official-nasa-has-declared-its-mars-spacecraft-maven-dead-sciencealert","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/459886\/","title":{"rendered":"It’s Official: NASA Has Declared Its Mars Spacecraft MAVEN Dead : ScienceAlert"},"content":{"rendered":"

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) \u2013 After six months of radio silence, NASA’s MAVEN spacecraft<\/a> around Mars<\/a> has been declared dead.<\/p>\n

The space agency confirmed Wednesday that the mission had ended<\/a> after more than a decade of observations.<\/p>\n

“The team really did experience the loss of a loved one with the end of the mission here,” said<\/a> NASA project manager Mike Moreau.<\/p>\n

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The spacecraft was launched in 2013 to study the red planet’s atmosphere from orbit.<\/p>\n

MAVEN<\/a> mysteriously fell silent in early December after passing behind Mars.<\/p>\n

Data indicated the spacecraft went into a fast spin, which disrupted its orbit and drained the onboard batteries.<\/p>\n

\"Subscribe<\/a><\/p>\n

A review board convened by NASA earlier this year concluded that the spacecraft is useless and unable to be recovered.<\/p>\n

It’s expected to remain in orbit for another 50 to 100 years before crashing into the planet, posing no issue to other spacecraft until then.<\/p>\n

An investigation continues into what caused the problem.<\/p>\n

The spacecraft has been studying Martian weather, and it observed a stray interstellar comet last year.<\/p>\n

\"TwoImages showing the sudden appearance of a bright aurora on Mars during a solar storm<\/a> in September 2017, using data from observations by the Imaging Ultraviolet Spectrograph instrument on MAVEN. (NASA\/University of Colorado Boulder-LASP<\/a>)<\/p>\n

MAVEN also helped relay information from NASA’s Curiosity and Perseverance rovers on the surface.<\/p>\n

NASA officials said four other spacecraft around Mars \u2013 two US and two European satellites \u2013 will pick up the slack, with no rover science lost.<\/p>\n

\"FourPhotos of Mars taken by MAVEN. (NASA via AP)<\/p>\n

The spacecraft advanced scientists’ understanding of the Martian atmosphere and evolution, MAVEN’s lead scientist, Shannon Curry of the University of Colorado Boulder, said.<\/p>\n

Related: Lightning ‘Whistler’ Detected on Mars For The First Time, Scientists Report<\/a><\/p>\n

“The team is certainly broken up about this,” Curry said.<\/p>\n

“But at the same time we are incredibly proud of the science we’ve accomplished over the last decade.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) \u2013 After six months of radio silence, NASA’s MAVEN spacecraft around Mars has been…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":459887,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[111,139,69,147,392],"class_list":["post-459886","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-space","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-science","tag-space"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/459886","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=459886"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/459886\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/459887"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=459886"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=459886"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=459886"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}