NASA has officially announced the end of the Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution (MAVEN) mission, marking the conclusion of an extraordinary journey that provided critical insights into the Red Planet for over a decade. The decision follows a period of silence from the spacecraft, which began in late 2025.
Launched on November 18, 2013, and entering Martian orbit on September 21, 2014, MAVEN was originally designed for a primary mission of just one year. However, the spacecraft far exceeded expectations, operating for more than 11 years and extending its planned lifespan by more than a decade, becoming a cornerstone of Martian atmospheric research.
The mission encountered a critical failure on December 6, 2025, when NASA experienced an unexpected loss of signal after the spacecraft passed behind Mars. In response, an anomaly review board was convened in February 2026 to evaluate potential recovery efforts and assess the spacecraft's condition. The board eventually determined that MAVEN is no longer recoverable and is incapable of performing its science and data relay functions.
Preliminary investigations suggest that the spacecraft entered a high-rate rotation after passing behind the planet, which disrupted its orbital trajectory and subsequently drained its batteries. This power failure left the communications system unable to transmit data back to Earth. While the root cause remains under investigation, NASA expects a final report to be released later this year.
Despite the loss of the hardware, the mission's legacy remains intact. NASA has initiated the formal decommissioning process and is archiving the complete mission dataset for the global science and exploration communities. The data gathered by MAVEN is considered invaluable for future endeavors.
"The science MAVEN has given us is key to informing what kind of radiation protection and safety measures we must take before sending humans to Mars," stated Louise Prockter, director of the Planetary Science Division at NASA Headquarters in Washington.
Reference(s):
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