Google+ Hangout with ESA about Europe's Mars exploration

Posted by Emily Lakdawalla

2013/10/04 09:00 CDT

Topics: podcasts and videos, ESA Budget, Mars Express, Future Mission Concepts, events and announcements, Mars

Here's the recording of this morning's European Space Agency hangout. They invited me to speak with Mars Express project scientist Olivier Witasse and spacecraft operations manager Michel Denis about Mars Express' 10 years of operations at Mars and ESA's future plans for the Red Planet. We also discussed the awesome work Mars Express has done at Phobos. Check out my new animations of Mars Express Phobos images.

The video is embedded below.

ESA / DLR / FU Berlin (G. Neukum)

Mars Express' closest-ever image of Phobos

Mars Express approached to within 93 kilometers of Phobos to snap this photo, on July 23, 2008. This image has been rotated so that north is up. It was summer at Mars, so the north pole is well-lit in this photo.