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Mars Climate Orbiter

Mars Climate Orbiter

Designed to study Mars from orbit and serve as a communications relay for the Mars Polar Lander and Deep Space probes, the Mars Climate Orbiter was unsuccessful due to a navigation error caused by a failure to translate English units to metric.

Mission Statistics

Launch Date

Dec. 11, 1998

Type

Orbiter

Target

Mars

Status

Past

About the mission

Designed to study Mars from orbit and serve as a communications relay for the Mars Polar Lander and Deep Space probes, the Mars Climate Orbiter was unsuccessful due to a navigation error caused by a failure to translate English units to metric.

Last contact with the spacecraft was on September 23, 1999, 9 months after launch, and an investigation found that the spacecraft burned up in Mars' atmosphere.

Instruments

  • Mars Color Imager (MARCI)
  • Pressure Modulated Infrared Radiometer (PMIRR)

More about Mars

Image .

Dao and Niger Valles

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Rabe Crater Dunes

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Ophir and Candor Chasmata

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Eumenides Dorsum

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Ingenuity and Perseverance Make Tracks

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Perseverance Views Drifting Clouds

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Chaos

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Icaria Fossae

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South Polar Ice

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South Polar Ice

Press Kit (PDF)
Mars Climate Orbiter Information on Solar System Exploration
Mars Climate Orbiter Information on National Space Science Data Center

Explore Other Missions

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MarCO

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Mariner 6

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