The US space agency (Nasa) says the veteran Mars Global Surveyor spacecraft is probably lost and irrecoverable. The orbiter entered a "safe mode" as it struggled to control a solar panel, and engineers have not been able to contact the probe since 2 November. Nasa will use the Rover Opportunity on the surface of the Red Planet to try to speak to the 10-year-old spacecraft in the next couple of days. However, mission officials concede they are not expecting success. "While we have not exhausted everything that we could do, we believe the prospect of recovery of MGS is not looking very good at all," said *** Li, Mars exploration programme manager at Nasa's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, California. "However, MGS has been a good friend; it's had an illustrious career, the data it has collected has taught us a lot about Mars and it will continue to teach us a lot about Mars. "We're still holding out some hope but we are fully prepared in our hearts that we may never be able to talk to the spacecraft again." The rover will use a low-power UHF antenna to try to contact MGS in the next couple of days. If it gets a reply, it will relay that response to Earth. The problem for Nasa is that its knowledge of MGS's precise orbital position has deteriorated because tracking has not been possible. As the period of silence continues, the uncertainty will grow and make detection or communication ever more difficult.
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