India’s first groundbreaking interplanetary mission ends as Mars spacecraft goes dark

Mangalyaan was intended to last only for about six months but carried on for nearly a decade

India’s iconic Mars orbiter which has surveyed the Red Planet since 2014, has lost communication with Earth, bringing its eight-year-long mission to an end, the country’s space agency has confirmed.

The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) on Monday said the pathbreaking orbiter lost communication with its ground station on Earth due to a long eclipse in April 2022.

ISRO said the craft’s fuel “must have been exhausted” and its desired attitude pointing could not be achieved for sustained power generation.

A source with the space agency told Indian news agency PTI that the orbiter’s battery was designed to handle eclipses for a duration of only about an hour and 40 minutes, adding that the long eclipse likely drained its power beyond the safe limit.

ISRO noted in a statement that the iconic mission, which was praised widely for its cost effectiveness, has attained its “end-of-life” with the spacecraft in a “non-recoverable” state.

The orbiter mission has thrown light on the composition of several gases in the outer layers of the Martian atmosphere and helped unravel potential mechanisms for the escape of atmosphere from Mars.

Research based on data from the orbiter on Martian dust storms also shed light on the dynamics of dust on the planet, ISRO chief S Somanath said at the meeting.

The Mangalyaan Mars mission, put together on a budget of Rs 4.5bn (around £50m at the time), was launched on ISRO’s Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV) and put India into the elite club of nations to conduct deep-space exploration.

Launched in November 2013 and inserted into Martian orbit after about 300 days of interplanetary journey, the spacecraft was initially designed as a technology demonstrator and intended to last only for about six months.

But the Mars Orbiter Mission remained for nearly eight years, encircling the Red Planet and helping conduct numerous research on Mars and the Sun before losing communication with Earth.

“Equipped with a suit of five scientific payloads onboard, during these eight years, the mission has gifted significant scientific understanding on the Martian surface features, morphology, as well as the Martian atmosphere and exosphere,” the space agency noted.