The Heart We Sold

So, according to the investigations of the Italian Space Agency (ASI), the cause of Schiaparelli’s unexpected crash would be due to the European Space Agency (ESA)’s responsibility, as they, in order to save money (supposedly one million €uros), would have hired the Rumanian ARCA Space Corporation rather than the Swedish Space Corporation – as the companies involved in the ExoMars mission were recommending – for performing Schiaparelli’s acceptance tests.

On November 1, 2016, the HiRISE camera on NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter observed the impact site of Europe’s Schiaparelli test lander, gaining the first color view of the site since the lander’s October 19 arrival. These cutouts cover locations where three parts of the spacecraft reached the ground. Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/University of Arizona.