NASA’s Perseverance rover has been hard at work on Mars, collecting pieces of rock and stowing them away on the Red Planet. But back on Earth, the space agency has been struggling to carry out its plan of retrieving the Martian samples. Following months of deliberation, NASA has decided to pursue two alternative routes for its Mars Sample Return program, one of which elicits the help of the private industry.
During a media briefing on Tuesday, NASA announced an unusual approach to its ambitious Martian sample mission. The space agency will simultaneously pursue two different ways of brining samples from the other world to Earth. “Pursuing two potential paths forward will ensure that NASA is able bring these samples back from Mars with significant cost and schedule saving compared to the previous plan,” NASA Administrator Bill Nelson said in a statement.
In April 2024, NASA called on the private industry to come up with alternative ways to pick up Martian rock and dust from the Red Planet and drop them off on Earth. The space agency asked for proposals for a less complex mission architecture that would lower cost and bring the samples to Earth at an earlier date. Five months later, the agency received 11 studies from both the NASA community and industry players, and a team was formed to assess the best way to return the samples.
At this point, NASA will proceed with “two distinct means of landing the payload platform on Mars,” the space agency wrote. The first option will involve tried and tested means of landing on Mars using a sky crane similar to ones used by NASA’s rovers, while the other option will opt for a new method developed by a commercial partner.
The two pathways would involve a smaller version of the Mars Ascent Vehicle, a lightweight rocket designed to launch the tubes containing the samples from Mars into the planet’s orbit. Both missions would also rely on the European Space Agency’s Earth Return Orbiter, which is designed to capture the orbiting sample container in Mars orbit. The sample container will hold 30 tubes.
“NASA’s rovers are enduring Mars’ harsh environment to collect ground-breaking science samples,” Nicky Fox, associate administrator for NASA’s Science Mission Directorate, said in a statement. “We want to bring those back as quickly as possible to study them in state-of-the-art facilities.”
NASA has been struggling with its Mars Sample Return mission, which has recently come under scrutiny for cost overruns and scheduling delays. In September 2023, an independent review board (IRB) issued a report on the mission, referring to it as a “highly constrained and challenging campaign,” with “unrealistic budget and schedule expectations from the beginning.” The mission was originally capped at a $7 billion budget to return the samples in the 2030s. It was later revealed, however, that Mars Sample Return requires an $11 billion budget, with an estimate of returning the samples by 2040. In light of the report, NASA began considering an alternative architecture for its complex mission.
Despite its complexities, Mars Sample Return is an unprecedented opportunity to study samples from another world up-close. “Mars Sample Return will allow scientists to understand the planet’s geological history and the evolution of climate on this barren planet where life may have existed in the past and shed light on the early solar system before life began here on Earth,” Fox said. “This will also prepare us to safely send the first human explorers to Mars.”
Passant Rabie
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