The #Mars Relay Network (#MRN) is an international constellation of spacecraft orbiting the Red Planet 🔴 that send #science data from surface rovers back to Earth

• #MarsOdyssey ~ 170.4 Mb/day
• #MRO ~ 447.5 Mb/day
• #ExoMars Trace Gas Orbiter ~ 1,562.7 Mb/day
• #MarsExpress - #ESA backup orbiter
https://science.nasa.gov/mars/mars-relay-network/

2021, ESA’s Mars Express spacecraft carried out experimental #communication 📶 tests with the Chinese (#CNSA) #Zhurong Mars rover https://www.esa.int/Enabling_Support/Operations/A_one-way_phone_call_at_Mars

#SpaceCommunication

Active #Mars 🔴 missions

• #Perseverance 🇺🇸 🛞
• #Curiosity 🇺🇸 🛞

• #Zhurong 🇨🇳 🛞🪫*

• #MarsOdyssey 🇺🇸 🛰️ 📶
• #Tianwen1 🇨🇳 🛰️ 📶
• #Hope 🇦🇪 🛰️ 📶
• #ExoMars Trace Gas Orbiter 🇪🇺🇷🇺 🛰️ 📶
• #MRO Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter 🇺🇸 🛰️ 📶
• #MarsExpress 🇪🇺 🛰️ 📶
• #ESCAPADE 🇺🇸 🛰️ 📶

• #MAVEN 🇺🇸 🛰️ 🔇 **

*🪫likely too much dust on its solar panels to generate power
** 🔇likely unrecoverable but not yet declared inactive

Active, past, future missions : https://www.planetary.org/space-missions/every-mars-mission

Picture CC BY-NC 3.0 https://www.planetary.org/space-images/the-mars-exploration-family-portrait

#ExoMars parachute 🪂 high-altitude drop test https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mWqlh6T-PFk&t=6s

#ESA #Mars

#ExoMars descent module drop test. A system installed in all four legs detects when the spacecraft approaches the surface and triggers the shutdown of the descent engines after a soft landing https://www.esa.int/ESA_Multimedia/Videos/2026/01/Legs_made_for_a_Mars_landing

On 7 July 2025 a high-altitude balloon carried a test capsule to an altitude of 29 kilometers to test the #parachute 🪂 under near-space conditions https://sscspace.com/news/esa-testing-martian-parachutes-from-the-edge-of-space/

#ESA #Mars

The #Rosalind rover has a 2-meter 📏 drill to collect deeper samples than any previous #Mars 🔴 mission, ground-penetrating radar to see up to 3 meters and a neutron spectrometer to locate promising underground water-rich 💧 deposits https://www.planetary.org/space-missions/exomars-rover

#ESA #ExoMars