Mars Climate Orbiter

Launch Success

Liftoff Time (GMT)

18:45:00

Friday December 11, 1998

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Mission Details

Launch Notes

While the spacecraft's intended mission was a failure due to an infamous unit conversion mistake, the launch and orbital setting of the spacecraft was successful.

Mars Climate Orbiter

Wiki

The Mars Climate Orbiter (formerly the Mars Surveyor '98 Orbiter) was a 338-kilogram (745 lb) robotic space probe launched by NASA on December 11, 1998, to study the Martian climate, Martian atmosphere, and surface changes and to act as the communications relay in the Mars Surveyor '98 program for Mars Polar Lander. However, on September 23, 1999, communication with the spacecraft was lost as the spacecraft went into orbital insertion, due to ground-based computer software which produced output in non-SI units of pound-force seconds (lbf·s) instead of the SI units of newton-seconds (N·s) specified in the contract between NASA and Lockheed. The spacecraft encountered Mars on a trajectory that brought it too close to the planet, and it was either destroyed in the atmosphere or re-entered heliocentric space after leaving Mars' atmosphere.

Heliocentric Orbit

1 Payload

338 kilograms

Rocket

Retired
Delta II 7425

Active 1998 to 2002

United Launch Alliance logo

Manufacturer

ULA

Rocket

Height: 38.1m

Payload to Orbit

GTO: 1,110 kg

Liftoff Thrust

3,020 Kilonewtons

Fairing

Diameter: 2.9m

Height: 8.49m

Stages

3

Strap-ons

4

Launch Site

SLC-17A

Cape Canaveral SFS, Florida, USA

Fastest Turnaround

11 days 12 hours

Stats

Delta II


77th

Mission

12th

Mission of 1998

1998


78th

Orbital launch attempt