Moscow (CNS) – China's first Mars-exploration space probe "Yinghuo 1" will be launched along with a Russian Mars probe "Phobos-Grunt" on early morning of November 9, at the Baikonur Cosmodrome, a launch complex in Kazakhstan.
"Yinghuo 1" and "Phobos-Grunt" will be launched at 0:26 a.m., aboard the Ukrainian Zenit rocket, reported the Information Telegraph Agency of Russia and Interfax.
Under multilateral cooperation between China, Europe, and Russia, the "Yinghuo 1" will orbit Mars for one year, with a mission of detecting the space environment on Mars.
Ground support will be provided by the European Space Agency. An interstellar probe monitoring station has been built at the Baikonur Cosmodrome.
After entering the orbit of Mars, the "Phobos-Grunt" will spend months determining a landing point on Phobos, a moon of Mars. The "Phobos-Grunt" aims to land on the Phobos to collect soil samples and return them to the Earth.
This will mark the first launch of a Russian Mars probe in this century, since the last one in 1996.
The "Phobos-Grunt" was shipped to the launch site on October 17, announced the Russian Federal Space Agency. A thorough test on the probe is underway.
