Space is Hard

On 19 October 2016 people watched in great anticipation as the European Space Agency’s ExoMars mission released the Schiaparelli lander on its journey to the surface of Mars. In unison, they all let out a collective sigh of disappointment as the news broke that the landing had not been successful. Following this, the press began to ask the inevitable questions – what went wrong and what does it mean for future missions to Mars? The news coverage focused entirely on the failure of the Schiaparelli lander. But this small craft was merely a tech demo for a future mission to Mars, bolted on to a much larger spacecraft.

Focusing on small failures rather than the large-scale success of a mission such as ExoMars reveals something interesting about our opinions on spaceflight. The expectation that everything should work highlights just how blasé we have become about space flight.

Back at Mars

The ExoMars mission, a collaborative project between the European and Russian space agencies, will study the atmosphere of Mars with its Trace Gas Orbiter or TGO. As the TGO orbits the planet it will use a suite of instruments to analyse the trace gases in Mars atmosphere. One of the things it will be looking for is methane, which is a key indicator of potential biological processes, in other words, life.

The secondary goal of the TGO is to act as a telecommunications relay station. This relay capability will support future Mars Rovers by transmitting their signals back to Earth, including the ExoMars rover, scheduled for launch in 2020.

Current reports suggest that the TGO successfully entered Martian orbit and worked almost perfectly. However, despite the success of the main segment of ExoMars, the media focus remains on the failure of the small lander section.

Is Space Routine?

We have reached a level of comfort with spaceflight such that satellite launches seem routine. Collectively we assume that within a few years we may be buying tickets for holidays to space or to visit other planets.

To some degree this is true, with Virgin Galactic’s spaceflights and SpaceX’s plans to sell tickets to colonise Mars. However, we often need reminding just how difficult space flight can be. Over the last few years we have seen several disasters, with both previously mentioned companies having major issues in the past two years. Often the problems we see in space flight occur because of one small system or process not working perfectly.

An example of this can be found with the recent rediscovery of the Beagle 2 mission on the surface of Mars. Previously it was thought the British probe had crashed, adding to the craters on Mars’ surface. However new imagery shows that the probe landed safely and partially began to deploy. It is thought that maybe a vital component broke or some obstacle blocked full deployment and thus ended the mission.

The fact that one small element could endanger a whole mission reinforces the fact that many things must work in synchronicity to ensure a successful space flight. We see this difficulty regularly in space travel. NASA maintain a list of missions to Mars and inspection of that list reveals that 59% of missions launched to Mars have suffered major failure.

As difficult as spaceflight is, our achievements over the last 60 years have been incredible. We have launched countless satellites, visited every planet in the Solar System, set foot on the Moon, and had people continuously living in space for the past 16 years.

When we look back on our achievements it easy so see why we have become complacent. Our everyday lives now rely on our ability to put things in space. This ability and reliance comes from many years spent practising and honing our spaceflight techniques and equipment, learning from each failure as much as we learn from each success.

So the next time you hear of a satellite or astronaut being launched into space, remember the complexity involved.

Remember that to get to space we rely on a tube full of explosives, blown up in a very specific way that propels the spacecraft sideways around the world at speeds greater than 15,000 miles an hour. Add to this the life support equipment, delicate electronics, and thousands of other tiny successes that all must work flawlessly in order to ensure that the satellite or astronaut can survive and perform in one of the most hostile environments we have ever encountered.