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India’s first attempt to land on the moon appears to end in failure
Ground teams lost communication with India's first lunar landing mission moments before its scheduled touchdown on the moon Friday, and the robotic research craft apparently crashed during final descent.
VideoLive coverage: Mission control loses contact with Indian moon lander
Indian ground teams lost contact with a robotic lunar lander and rover minutes before their scheduled touchdown near the moon's south pole. India was attempting to become the fourth country to achieve a soft landing on the moon.
VideoIndian moon lander ready for final descent
The Vikram lander, part of India's Chandrayaan 2 mission launched in July, will attempt to land near the lunar south pole Friday and deploy a rover to conduct the first on-the-ground scientific surveys away from the moon's equatorial regions.
Mini-helicopter installed on NASA’s next Mars-bound rover
Engineers at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California have attached a flying helicopter drone to the belly of the Mars 2020 rover set for launch next July.
VideoExoMars rover leaves British factory, heads for testing in France
The European Space Agency's ExoMars rover left its Airbus factory in Britain on Wednesday, heading for a round of testing in France before integration with its carrier and descent modules on pace for launch toward the Red Planet next July.
Astrobotic lunar lander to launch on ULA’s first Vulcan rocket
Astrobotic, a Pittsburgh-based company developing a robotic lunar lander, will launch its first moon mission under contract to NASA on the debut flight of United Launch Alliance's Vulcan Centaur rocket in 2021, officials announced Monday.
Chandrayaan 2 arrives in lunar orbit, targets moon landing next month
India's Chandrayaan 2 spacecraft braked into orbit around the moon Tuesday, positioning the robotic science mission for a landing in the moon's south pole region Sept. 6.
ExoMars parachute failures could jeopardize 2020 launch date
The European Space Agency has confirmed a parachute for the ExoMars rover mission set for launch next July failed during a test over Sweden earlier this month, the project's second parachute test accident since May.
NASA’s first interplanetary smallsats may struggle to stay under cost caps
The first set of proposals for a new class of small robotic probes NASA wants to dispatch across the solar system came in with higher cost estimates than agency officials expected, a NASA manager said Sunday.
VideoMars 2020 rover on track for launch next July
The launch of NASA's Mars 2020 rover is less than a year away, and the steady pace of work inside the craft's pristine assembly hall in California is keeping the mission on schedule for liftoff from Cape Canaveral next July, despite growing costs, according to mission managers.