* Astronomy

Blobrana · L

RE: Phobos-Grunt Mission

Blobrana · L

Update:
According to US 'official' sources Phobos-Grunt re-entered at ~17:20 UT.

Ed ~ No error time window was given.

Blobrana · L

Update:
Observers, in South America, report no sightings of Phobos-Grunt at the predicted time. This indicates that the dispersion pattern of fragments were confined to over the Pacific ocean.

Blobrana · L

Pieces from the Phobos-Ground, which had become stuck in Earth's orbit, landed in water 1,250 kilometres (775 miles) west of Wellington Island in Chile's south, the Russian military Air and Space Defence Forces said in a statement carried by the country's news agencies.
Read more

Blobrana · L

Pieces of the Phobos-Grunt craft, which never made it out of orbit after its launch on a mission to probe the Martian moon Phobos, fell into the sea 775 miles (1,250 km) west of the coastal island of Wellington, aerospace defence forces spokesman Colonel Alexei Zolotukhin said.
It was not immediately clear whether all of the debris from the craft fell at that location.
Read more

Blobrana · L

Phobos-Grunt: Failed probe 'falls over Pacific'

Orbital tracking reports suggest Russia's failed Mars probe, Phobos-Grunt, fell back to Earth on Sunday, to be destroyed over the Pacific.
Both Russian and US military sources announced the demise of the craft within minutes of each other.
It brings to an end the sorry story of this mission, which promised to return rocky samples from Mars' biggest moon.
Read more

Blobrana · L

Update:
Roskosmos confirms officially that Phobos-Grunt landed in the Pacific Ocean 700 miles West of Wellington.

Blobrana · L

The Space agency Roskosmos said the Russian Mars probe named "Phobos-Grunt" crashed into the Pacific, late Sunday afternoon.
Read more (German)

Blobrana · L

Space agency Roskosmos said debris from its doomed 14-ton spacecraft, which includes 11 tons of toxic rocket fuel, would likely fall to Earth between 1750 GMT and 1834 GMT, possibly in the Atlantic Ocean about midway between Brazil and West Africa.
Read more

Ed ~ Observers in Spain may be able to see the spacecraft at 18:15 UT (If it hasn't already re-entered).

Blobrana · L

The ground track of the spacecraft is now passing over South america (if Roskosmos calculations are correct)