Russian Phobos-Grunt Mars probe crashes into Pacific

PanARMENIAN.Net - Doomed Russian Phobos-Grunt Mars probe that's been stuck in Earth orbit for two months crashed down in the Pacific Ocean late Sunday, RIA Novosti reports.

"Phobos-Grunt fragments have crashed down in the Pacific Ocean," Russia's Defense Ministry official Alexei Zolotukhin said, adding that the fragments fell in 1,250 kilometers to the west of the island of Wellington.

Phobos-Grunt, launched on November 9, was designed to bring back rock and soil samples from the Martian moon Phobos. However, it has been stuck in a so-called support orbit since its engines failed to put it on course for the Red Planet.

The head of Roscosmos, Vladimir Popovkin, previously said the probe would break up during reentry into the atmosphere and none of the fragments are likely to reach the Earth.

The $165-million spacecraft, designed to retrieve soil samples from the Martian moon Phobos, was meant to be Russia's first successful interplanetary mission in over two decades.

NASA says Russia has failed in all 17 of its attempts to study the Red Planet close-up since 1960. The most recent failure before last month occurred in 1996, when Russia lost its Mars-96 orbiter during launch.