The Russian spacecraft Phobos-Grunt fell into the Pacific Ocean some 1,250 kilometers west of Wellington, Chile yesterday after circling in Earth orbit for two months. The spacecraft was designed to retrieve soil samples from Phobos, the largest satellite of Mars, but its engines failed and became stuck in an orbit around Earth before returning.

The Russian Federal Space Agency said the spacecraft was in a near-Earth orbit with perigee 113.8 km and apogee 133.2 km at 8.15 p.m. UTC yesterday. It fell into the Pacific ocean around 9.45 p.m.

It is unknown whether any segments reached the surface. New Zealanders reported seeing the spacecraft glowing orange as it passed eastwards.

Russian officials plan to determine the reasons behind the failure of the mission, considered as a major setback for the Russian agency. Vadim Lukashevich commented, “Five and half billion rubles and all the hopes of Russian space science for a revival, today burn up without any glory in the earth’s atmosphere.”

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