Scientific American is the essential guide to the most awe-inspiring advances in science and technology, explaining how they change our understanding of the world and shape our lives. The Rosalind Franklin rover was set to embark for Mars later this year, but the deteriorating relationship between Europe and Russia now makes that very unlikely
Europe’s ExoMars rover, built to search for traces of life on the Red Planet, is unlikely to launch as planned in September aboard a Russian rocket as a result of sanctions rolled out by European countries in response to Russian aggression in Ukraine. The ExoMars mission, which comprises the Trace Gas Orbiter (in orbit around Mars since 2016) and the yet-to-launch U.K.-built Rosalind Franklin rover, is the European Space Agency ’s (ESA) most significant cooperation with Russia apart from the International Space Station. The mission, which ESA originally developed with NASA, faced cancellation in 2012 after the American space agency withdrew due to budget cuts under U.S. President Barack Obama. Russia’s space agency, Roscosmos, stepped in and revived the mission. Its contribution includes the rover’s Kazachok landing platform, several science instruments, and launch on Russia’s heavy-lift Proton rocket. ESA admitted that the September launch now appears unlikely in a new statement released on Monday (Feb.28). “We are fully implementing sanctions imposed on Russia by our Member States,” ESA officials wrote in the statement. “Regarding the ExoMars program continuation, the sanctions and the wider context make a launch in 2022 very unlikely.
