Anonymous10 days ago
NASA officially declared the MAVEN Mars orbiter dead on June 3, 2026, six months after the spacecraft began spinning uncontrollably behind Mars, draining its batteries and severing all communication. The loss of the $787 million mission — which produced over 800 peer-reviewed papers and served as a critical relay node for Mars rovers — leaves an irreplaceable gap in atmospheric science and strains an aging Mars communications network, even as the smaller ESCAPADE mission approaches the Red Planet.