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Mars exploration in focus as Europe prepares ExoMars Rover for search of life

ESA's ExoMars rover will roam the rusty Martian surface in search for signs of life. Credit: ESA

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2020 may be the year humanity takes its biggest step toward finding evidence of life beyond Earth. NASA and the European Space Agency (ESA) are each working on its own rover that will roam Mars’s surface in search of life.

The ExoMars mission is Europe’s first Mars rover. Named after British DNA pioneer Rosalind Franklin, the golf cart-sized robot is approximately one-third the size of NASA’s planned Mars 2020 rover and will look for signs that life might have existed on Mars.

Both rovers will act as remote scientists, beaming back a wealth of data and images to Earth.

Mars 2020 will collect Martian samples for eventual return to Earth sometime in the future, while ExoMars will use its unique drill to burrow below the surface. Here, the rover will find pristine samples that were shielded from the harsh radiation bombarding Mars’s surface. Scientists are hopeful that below the surface is where we could find our first evidence of life. 

A Rover’s Purpose

Mars is a hostile place. Because its atmosphere is much thinner than Earth’s, life as we know it would have a difficult time surviving on the surface.

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Billions of years ago, the surface of Mars was probably quite similar to that of Earth. However, that changed when Mars lost its magnetic field, which stripped its atmosphere, and exposed its surface to intense radiation. All of which made survival above ground incredibly challenging.

Historically, Mars missions have searched for signs of life on the planet’s surface, usually at places where there are signs of ancient water. That’s because this is typically where we find life on Earth.

But since we haven’t found life on the planet’s surface yet, mission scientists propose we need to dig deeper. There may be some microbial Martians underground.

The ExoMars rover (and accompanying lander) are a follow-on to ESA’s ExoMars Orbiter mission which reached Mars in 2016. That initial mission consisted of two parts: the Trace Gas Orbiter (TGO) and the Schiaparelli landing demonstrator. 

Landing on Mars

TGO made it to Mars and is doing great, however, Schiaparelli didn’t fare so well — the lander crashed during its descent to the Martian surface. 

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Landing a probe on Mars is not easy. To safely navigate the tenuous Martian atmosphere requires a combination of sophisticated landing gear, including heat shields, retrorockets, and even giant, inflatable airbags. 

Despite the crash landing, Schiaparelli achieved its goal as a technology demonstrator. It also showed that the team needed to revamp the landing system before the rover launches. But, with less than a year till liftoff, the rover team is struggling with an established piece of landing architecture: parachutes

In order to slow the rover down, the mission requires multiple parachutes — one 15 meters (49 feet) in diameter and one 35 meters (115 feet).  

As the rover begins its descent, atmospheric drag will slow the craft from around 21 000 km/h (13,048 mph) to 1700 km/h (1,056 mph). That’s when the first parachute will deploy. About 20 seconds later, at about 400 km/h (248 mph), the second chute will deploy. Lastly, the braking engines will kick in about 1 km (or half a mile) above the ground, enabling the rover land safely on the Martian surface.

The entire sequence takes just six minutes.

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Parachute Troubles

During high-altitude testing conducted earlier this year, the craft’s parachutes ripped as soon as they deployed. ESA engineers made several adjustments, including reinforcing both the parachutes and their storage bags with Teflon to make them deploy easier. The chutes are still tearing.  

Now the agency is turning to NASA for help. ESA engineers are teaming up with the folks at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, to put the enhanced parachutes through months of rigorous testing. 

In the meantime, the rover team is putting its hardware through a round of thermal testing. For 18 days it will be subjected to the same harsh temperature conditions experienced on Mars. 

The parachutes are expected to finish testing sometime in April 2020; they will then be integrated with the rover and shipped to the launch site in Kazakhstan. However, if any part of the mission misses its deadline, the entire project could be sidelined until the next favorable Mars launch window — in 2022.

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Tesla Cybertruck fleet takes over at SpaceX’s Starbase

Interestingly, the Cybertruck uses the same exterior, a stainless steel alloy, as SpaceX rockets. This synergy between the two companies and their very different products shows a very unified mentality between Musk companies.

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Credit: @derek1ee | X

Tesla Cybertrucks have taken over at SpaceX’s Starbase facility in Texas, as hundreds of the all-electric pickup trucks were spotted late last week rounding out a massive fleet of vehicles.

The Cybertruck fleet is geared toward replacing gas vehicles that are used at Starbase for everyday operations. The only surprise about this is that it was not done sooner:

Deliveries have been going on for a few weeks, as Cybertrucks have made their way across the state of Texas from Austin to Starbase so they could be included in SpaceX’s fleet of vehicles at the facility.

Interestingly, the Cybertruck uses the same exterior, a stainless steel alloy, as SpaceX rockets. This synergy between the two companies and their very different products shows a very unified mentality between Musk companies.

However, there are some other perspectives to consider as SpaceX is utilizing such a massive fleet of Cybertrucks. Some media outlets (unsurprisingly) are seeing this as a move of weakness by both Tesla and SpaceX, as the aerospace company is, in a sense, “bailing out” lagging sales for the all-electric pickup.

It’s no secret that Tesla has struggled with the Cybertruck this year, and deliveries have been underwhelming in the sense that the company was anticipating between 1 million and 2 million orders for the vehicle before it was widely produced.

A lot of things changed with the Cybertruck between its 2019 unveiling and 2023 initial deliveries, most notably, price.

The price of the Cybertruck swelled significantly and priced out many of those who had pre-ordered it. Some have weighed the option of whether this purchase was a way to get rid of sitting inventory.

However, it seems more logical to consider the fact that SpaceX was likely always going to transition to Teslas for its fleet, especially at Starship, at some point.

It doesn’t seem out of the question that one Musk company would utilize another Musk company’s products, especially considering the Cybertruck has been teased as the vehicle that would be present on Mars.

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SpaceX opens up free Starlink service for those impacted by Hurricane Melissa

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(Credit: Starlink | X)

SpaceX is opening up its internet service, Starlink, to those impacted by Hurricane Melissa, as it made landfall in Jamaica and the Bahamas as a Category 5 storm.

Hurricane Melissa is expected to reach wind speeds of over 165 MPH over the next few days as it extends out into the Atlantic Ocean by Thursday and Friday.

Citizens in Jamaica and the Bahamas have been preparing for the storm for the past week, getting necessary goods together and preparing for the massive storm to arrive. It finally did yesterday, and the first images and video of the storm are showing that it could destroy many parts of both countries.

Starlink is now being opened up for free until the end of November for those impacted by the storm in Jamaica and the Bahamas, SpaceX announced today:

It is a move similar to the one the company made last year as Hurricane Helene made its way through the United States, destroying homes and property across the East Coast. SpaceX offered free service for those impacted by the destruction caused by the storm.

The free Starlink service was available until the end of 2024.

Elon Musk’s companies have also made similar moves to help out those who are impacted by natural disasters. Tesla has offered Free Supercharging in the past, most notably during the California wildfires.

Tesla and SpaceX’s LA fire relief efforts: Cybertrucks, free Starlink and more

One major advantage of Starlink is that it is available for use in situations like this one, where power might be required to operate things like a modem and router.

Internet access is a crucial part of survival in these situations, especially as it can be the last leg some stand on to get in touch with emergency services or loved ones.

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SpaceX reaches incredible Starlink milestone

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Credit: SpaceX

SpaceX has reached an incredible milestone with its Starlink program, officially surpassing 10,000 satellites launched into low Earth orbit since starting the program back in 2019.

Last Sunday, October 19, SpaceX launched its 131st and 132nd Falcon 9 missions of 2025, one from Cape Canaveral, Florida, and the other from Vandenberg, California.

The 10,000th Starlink satellite was aboard the launch from California, which was Starlink 11-19, and held 28 v2 mini optimized satellites.

The achievement was marked by a satellite tracker developed by Jonathan McDowell.

The first Starlink launch was all the way back on May 23, 2019, as SpaceX launched its first 60 satellites from Cape Canaveral using a Falcon 9 rocket.

Of the over 10,000 satellites in orbit, the tracker says 8,608 are operational, as some are intentionally de-orbited after becoming faulty and destroyed in the atmosphere.

SpaceX has truly done some really incredible things during its development of the Starlink program, including launch coverage in a global setting, bringing along millions of active subscribers that use the service for personal and business use, locking up commercial partnerships, and more.

Starlink currently operates in around 150 countries, territories, and markets and is available at least somewhere on all seven continents.

Additionally, Starlink has over 5 million subscribers worldwide, and 2.7 million have joined the program over the past year. It has revolutionized internet access on commercial aircraft as well, as several high-profile airlines like Qatar and United, among many others, have already installed Starlink on some of their planes to deliver more stable connectivity for passengers and crew.

SpaceX has the approval to launch 12,000 Starlink satellites from the FAA, but it plans to bring over 30,000 to its constellation, giving anyone the ability to have access to high-speed internet.

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