Status Report

Mars Express Status Report 25 Aug 2003

By SpaceRef Editor
August 28, 2003
Filed under , , ,
Mars Express Status Report 25 Aug 2003
mars express

August 25, 2003: Now about 20 million kilometers from Earth, the Mars Express spacecraft
platform subsystems (thermal, power, attitude and orbit control, on-board data
handling) continue to behave in a nominal manner.

Near-Earth spacecraft
commissioning has been successfully completed, and spacecraft activities are now
focusing on the remaining checkouts to be performed during the Interplanetary
Cruise phase, the trajectory correction maneuvers and the preparations for Mars
Orbit Insertion.

Analysis of the power situation at Mars and the impact on both
the recently selected orbit and the payload operations is being assessed.

Near-Earth payload commissioning, including the Beagle-2 lander checkout, was
successfully completed in July. The Interplanetary Cruise payload checkout is
under preparation by the scientific and operations teams.

SpaceRef staff editor.