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2001 Mars Odyssey

2001 Mars Odyssey
Artist's impression of the Mars Odyssey spacecraft
Mission typeMars orbiter
OperatorNASA / JPL
COSPAR ID2001-013A Edit this at Wikidata
SATCAT no.26734
Websitemars.jpl.nasa.gov/odyssey/
Mission duration
  • Elapsed:
    • 24 years, 1 month and 13 days from launch
    • 23 years, 6 months and 26 days at Mars (8379 sols)
  • En route: 6 months, 17 days
  • Primary mission: 32 months (1007 sols)
  • Extended mission: 20 years, 8 months and 25 days (7370 sols) elapsed
Spacecraft properties
ManufacturerLockheed Martin
Launch mass725 kg[1]
Dry mass376.3 kilograms (830 lb)
Power750 W
Start of mission
Launch dateApril 7, 2001, 15:02:22 (2001-04-07UTC15:02:22Z) UTC[1]
RocketDelta II 7925-9.5
Launch siteCape Canaveral SLC-17A
ContractorBoeing
End of mission
Last contactQ4 2025 (planned)
Orbital parameters
Reference systemAreocentric
RegimeSun-synchronous
Semi-major axis3,793.4 km (2,357.1 mi)[2]
Eccentricity0.0
Altitude400 km (250 mi)[2]
Inclination93.064°[2]
Period2 hours[2]
RAAN34.98°[2]
Argument of periareion0°[2]
Mean anomaly0°[2]
EpochOctober 19, 2002[2]
Mars orbiter
Orbital insertionOctober 24, 2001,
MSD 45435 12:21 AMT

2001 Mars Odyssey is a robotic spacecraft orbiting the planet Mars. The project was developed by NASA, and contracted out to Lockheed Martin, with an expected cost for the entire mission of US$297 million. Its mission is to use spectrometers and a thermal imager to detect evidence of past or present water and ice, as well as study the planet's geology and radiation environment.[3] The data Odyssey obtains is intended to help answer the question of whether life once existed on Mars and create a risk-assessment of the radiation that future astronauts on Mars might experience. It also acts as a relay for communications between the Curiosity rover, and previously the Mars Exploration Rovers and Phoenix lander, to Earth. The mission was named as a tribute to Arthur C. Clarke, evoking the name of his and Stanley Kubrick's 1968 film 2001: A Space Odyssey.[4][5]

Odyssey was launched April 7, 2001, on a Delta II rocket from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, and reached Mars orbit on October 24, 2001, at 02:30 UTC (October 23, 19:30 PDT, 22:30 EDT).[6] As of March 2025, it is still collecting data, and is estimated to have enough propellant to function until the end of 2025.[7] It currently holds the record for the longest-surviving continually active spacecraft in orbit around a planet other than Earth, ahead of the Pioneer Venus Orbiter (served 14 years[8]) and the Mars Express (serving over 20 years), at 23 years, 6 months and 26 days. As of October 2019 it is in a polar orbit around Mars with a semi-major axis of about 3,800 km or 2,400 miles.

On May 28, 2002 (sol 210), NASA reported that Odyssey's GRS instrument had detected large amounts of hydrogen, a sign that there must be ice lying within a meter of the planet's surface, and proceeded to map the distribution of water below the shallow surface.[9] The orbiter also discovered vast deposits of bulk water ice near the surface of equatorial regions.[10]

Odyssey has also served as the primary means of communications for NASA's Mars surface explorers in the past decade, up to the Curiosity rover.

  1. ^ a b "2001 Mars Odyssey". NASA Space Science Data Coordinated Archive. Retrieved 2022-11-29.
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h Makovsky, A.; Barbieri, A.; Tung, R. (October 2002). Odyssey Telecommunications (PDF) (Report). p. 7.
  3. ^ "Mars Odyssey Goals". NASA JPL. April 16, 2024.
  4. ^ "Mars Odyssey: Overview". JPL, CIT. Archived from the original on 2011-09-19.
  5. ^ "It's "2001 Mars Odyssey" for NASA's next trip to the red planet" (Press release). NASA. Archived from the original on 2021-04-18.
  6. ^ "2001 Mars Odyssey Quick Facts". 2001 Mars Odyssey. NASA/JPL. December 4, 2017. Retrieved 2021-01-22.
  7. ^ "Engineers Keep an Eye on Fuel Supply of NASA's Oldest Mars Orbiter". JPL. NASA. March 15, 2023. Retrieved 2023-03-15.
  8. ^ "Pioneer Venus 1: In Depth". NASA Solar System Exploration. NASA. December 21, 2017.
  9. ^ "January, 2008: Hydrogen Map". Lunar & Planetary Lab at The University of Arizona. Archived from the original on 2008-10-13. Retrieved 2015-06-30.
  10. ^ Equatorial locations of water on Mars: Improved resolution maps based on Mars Odyssey Neutron Spectrometer data (PDF). Jack T. Wilson, Vincent R. Eke, Richard J. Massey, Richard C. Elphic, William C. Feldman, Sylvestre Maurice, Luıs F. A. Teodoroe. Icarus, 299, 148–160. January 2018.

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