Missions to Mars: A 50-year flashback

A look at Mars missions by mankind, both successful and failed, in the last fifty years

As the fourth planet from the Sun, Mars is the second smallest celestial body in the solar system. Named after Roman god of war, it is also known as the red planet due to the presence of iron oxide in abundance that gives it a reddish appearance.

Both Earth and Mars have roughly the same period of revolution around their axis. While Earth takes 365 days to orbit the Sun once, Mars takes 687 days to move around Sun. More missions have been attempted to Mars by scientists than to any other place in the Solar System except the satellite Moon. About half of the attempts have failed.

According to Planetary.org, some of these failures occurred because Mars was the first planet Earth attempted to explore, and the early exploration attempts taught us many lessons that have made subsequent missions more successful.

Recently Isro Chairman K Radhakrishnan told Business Standard that Isro got advantage of being late, considering the fact it has learnt from the previous mistakes, done by others.

Since 1996, Mars exploration has undergone a renaissance, with data from four orbiters and four landed missions developing a revolutionary new view of Mars as an Earth-like world with a complex geologic history. Here is a list of Mars missions by mankind, both successful and failed, in the last fifty years:

Launch Date	Name	Country	Result	Reason
2013	Mangalyaan	India	Success	Inserted in Martian Orbit
2013	Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution	US	Success	Studying the Martian atmosphere
2011	Phobos-Grunt/Yinghuo-1	Russia/China	Failure	Stranded in Earth orbit
2011	Mars Science Laboratory	US	Success	Exploring Mars' habitability
2007	Phoenix Mars Lander	US	Success	Returned more than 25 gigabits of data
2005	Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter	US	Success	Returned more than 26 terabits of data (more than all other Mars missions combined)
2003	Mars Exploration Rover - Opportunity	US	Success	Operating lifetime of more than 15 times original warranty
2003	Mars Exploration Rover - Spirit	US	Success	Operating lifetime of more than 15 times original warranty
2003	Mars Express Orbiter/Beagle 2 Lander	ESA	Success/Failure	Orbiter imaging Mars in detail and lander lost on arrival
2001	Mars Odyssey	US	Success	High resolution images of Mars
1999	Deep Space 2 Probes (2)	US	Failure	Lost on arrival (carried on Mars Polar Lander)
1999	Mars Polar Lander	US	Failure	Lost on arrival
1998	Mars Climate Orbiter	US	Failure	Lost on arrival
1998	Nozomi	Japan	Failure	No orbit insertion; fuel problems
1996	Mars Pathfinder	US	Success	Technology experiment lasting 5 times longer than warranty
1996	Mars 96	Russia	Failure	Launch vehicle failure
1996	Mars Global Surveyor	US	Success	More images than all Mars Missions
1992	Mars Observer	US	Failure	Lost prior to Mars arrival
1988	Phobos 2 Orbiter/Lander	USSR	Failure	Lost near Phobos
1988	Phobos 1 Orbiter	USSR	Failure	Lost en route to Mars
1975	Viking 2 Orbiter/Lander	US	Success	Returned 16,000 images and extensive atmospheric data and soil experiments
1975	Viking 1 Orbiter/Lander	US	Success	Located landing site for Lander and first successful landing on Mars
1973	Mars 7 Lander	USSR	Failure	Missed planet; now in solar orbit.
1973	Mars 6 Orbiter/Lander	USSR	Success/Failure	Occultation experiment produced data and Lander failure on descent
1973	Mars 5	USSR	Success	Returned 60 images; only lasted 9 days
1973	Mars 4	USSR	Failure	Flew past Mars
1971	Mariner 9	US	Success	Returned 7,329 images
1971	Mars 3 Orbiter/Lander	USSR	Success	Orbiter obtained approximately 8 months of data and lander landed safely, but only 20 seconds of data
1971	Mars 2 Orbiter/Lander	USSR	Failure	Orbiter arrived, but no useful data and Lander destroyed
1971	Kosmos 419	USSR	Failure	Achieved Earth orbit only
1971	Mariner 8	US	Failure	Launch failure
1969	Mariner 7	US (flyby)	Success	Returned 126 images
1969	Mariner 6	US (flyby)	Success	Returned 75 images
1969	Mars 1969B	USSR	Failure	Launch vehicle failure
1969	Mars 1969A	USSR	Failure	Launch vehicle failure
1964	Zond 2	USSR (flyby)	Failure	Radio failed
1964	Mariner 4	US (flyby)	Success	Returned 21 images
1964	Mariner 3	US (flyby)	Failure	Shroud failed to jettison
1962	Korabl 13	USSR (flyby)	Failure	Earth orbit only; spacecraft broke apart
1962	Mars 1	USSR (flyby)	Failure	Radio Failed
1962	Korabl 11	USSR (flyby)	Failure	Earth orbit only; spacecraft broke apart
1960	Korabl 5	USSR (flyby)	Failure	Didn't reach Earth orbit
1960	Korabl 4	USSR (flyby)	Failure	Didn't reach Earth orbit