2009: Red October for the Red Planet

The Russian spacecraft Phobos-Grunt will launch to Mars next October (2009) along with what is China's first planetary mission named Yinghuo-1 [Mars-1, Firefly-1] in a bilaterial exploration of the Red Planet and one of the Martian moons Phobos [vid].

China’s Yinghuo-1 and Russia’s Phobos-Grunt probes will fly to Mars together onboard a Russian by a Russian Zenit rocket with a Fregat upper stage from Baikonur Cosmodrome. The two spacecraft will fly together for 11 months, and will carry out separate missions upon reaching the Martian orbit in September 2010.

During the flight to Mars, the two satellites will be connected by cables and Phobos-Grunt will supply the energy for Yinghuo-1 which will will focus mainly on the study of the external environment of Mars. Chinese researchers will use photographs and data to study the magnetic field of Mars and the interaction between ionospheres, escape particles and solar wind.

The Russian spacecraft ("Phobos Soil") mission’s objectives are to collect soil samples from Phobos, a satellite of Mars and to bring the samples back to Earth for comprehensive scientific research into Phobos, Mars and Martian space [video].

Phobos-Grunt makes the Russian space program first return to Mars in excess of a decade yet it will be the second mission to the moon Phobos [vids]. Five new missions are now being planned to Mars in the decade ahead.