The team in charge of the Mars Pathfinder mission, after spending the past month in frantic efforts to re-establish communication with the spacecraft and its roving companion, Tuesday announced that they have nearly given up hope and are pulling the plug.
But the team stressed that the twin craft had already far exceeded the requirements, and even the hopes, of project designers by sending back data over nearly three months when the mission was designed to last 30 days."In every respect, Pathfinder exceeded expectations - it was an unqualified success," said deputy project manager Brian Muirhead of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration's jet propulsion lab.
The Pathfinder team will continue to send radio signals to the craft every two weeks, at least until the end of the year, Muirhead said. But there is little hope that the craft will respond, he said. Even though Pathfinder can still get power from its solar panels, its batteries have probably died.