Mars Mission Set to Launch to Study

Gases and Storms

By KENNETH CHANG MARCH 12, 2016

The ExoMars 2016 mission a collaboration between the European and Russian
space agencies is scheduled to blast off from Kazakhstan on Monday.
The spacecraft, which consists of an orbiter that will measure methane and other gases
in the Martian atmosphere and a lander to study dust storms, will hitch a ride on top of
a Russian Proton rocket that is expected to lift off at 3:31 p.m. local time. The European
Space Agency will broadcast coverage of the launch on the Internet beginning about an
hour before liftoff.
After a journey of seven months, the ExoMars spacecraft will arrive at Marsin October.
Three days before arriving, the lander, named Schiaparelli after the 19th-century Italian
astronomer Giovanni Schiaparelli, will separate from the orbiter. It is to enter the
atmosphere at 13,000 miles per hour and quickly decelerate on its way to settling down
on the surface.

The main objective of Schiaparelli is to demonstrate its landing system. (The European
Space Agencys last attempt to land on Mars the Beagle 2 spacecraft, which
accompanied the Mars Express orbiter in 2003 failed.)
A Russian Proton rocket will carry the ExoMars 2016 spacecraft. Liftoff is scheduled for
Monday in Kazakhstan. CreditEsa/Getty Images
Schiaparelli carries instruments to measure Marss atmosphere during the height of the
dust storm season. Its batteries are expected to last only two to four days. The Trace Gas
Orbiter is to operate much longer, until at least 2022, circling Mars at an altitude of 250
miles. Its instruments will measure gases, like methane, water vapor and nitrogen, that
exist in minute quantities but that could hold important clues about the possibility of
life on Mars.
Methane is the most intriguing trace gas. Sunlight and chemical reactions break up
methane molecules in the atmosphere. Any methane there must have been created
recently, and the two possibilities for creating methane are microbes and a geological
process requiring heat and liquid water.
Mars Express made tenuous detections of methane, but its instruments were not
sensitive enough for definitive conclusions. NASAs Curiosity rover also detected a
transient whiff of methane in 2014.
Methane is a hot topic, Jorge Vago, the project scientist, said in a European Space
Agency video. So trying to understand the origin of the methane, and where on the
surface of Mars, and when its being produced and how it is destroyed is very
important.
The ExoMars spacecraft was originally to be launched by NASA, but tight budgets led
NASA to back out in 2012, and the Russians stepped in. The second half of the
European-Russian ExoMars collaboration a rover is scheduled to launch in 2018,
but that mission is expected to slip to 2020.