MOSCOW, Dec. 14 (UPI) -- Russia's Phobos-Grunt spacecraft, stuck in the wrong orbit for more than a month, will not be able to complete its Mars mission, one of its builders says.
"We should admit that Phobos-Grunt has failed to fulfill its main mission of reaching Mars," Viktor Khartov, the head and chief designer of the Lavochkin spacecraft construction bureau, told RIA Novosti in Moscow Wednesday. "This is a fact. Mission Impossible."
The spacecraft, launched Nov. 9, was designed to bring back rock and soil samples from the Martian moon Phobos, but has been stranded in a so-called support orbit since its thrusters failed to put it on course for the Red Planet.
It will probably fall back to Earth in mid-January, Khartov said.
Attempts by Russian and European specialists to regain control of the troubled spacecraft have failed, and a special commission has been formed to analyze the causes of the mission failure, RIA Novosti said.
