The MAVEN spacecraft had to make an unplanned maneuver this week in order to avoid a collision with the Mars satellite Phobos.
The spacecraft has been in Mars orbit for just over two years. The main tasks of the probe are to study the upper atmosphere, ionosphere and the interaction of the Red Planet with the Sun and solar wind. On Tuesday, February 28, the spacecraft launched its rocket engines and increased its speed by 0.4 meters per second. Despite the fact that a small correction was enough for the probe to avoid a collision, notice the danger of convergence, NASA specialists a week later, MAVEN would crash into Phobos.
Notably, this is the first collision avoidance maneuver carried out by the MAVEN spacecraft in orbit on Mars to prevent a collision with Phobos.
MAVEN flies in an elliptical orbit around Mars, its trajectory intersecting with other spacecraft and Phobos many times throughout the year. During the intersection of trajectories, objects have the possibility of collision if this occurs simultaneously. However, such scenarios have been taken into account and are carefully monitored by specialists in the NASA jet propulsion laboratory in Pasadena.
