The failure of ExoMars made news lately, but it is not the only unsuccessful space mission. There are many other missions which tried to explore more about Mars and failed miserably.
Since the 1960s, craft operating missions for exploring the Martian surface have failed several times. The unsuccessful ExoMars mission with the Schiaparelli Mars lander, is the second failure for Europe after the first unsuccessful attempt in 2003. ExoMars was a joint mission of the European Space Agency (ESA) and Russian Federal Space Agency (RFSA).
- Sputnik 24
A Soviet mission was launched way back in 1962 in which a spacecraft named Sputnik 24 failed to leave Earth's orbit. The engine burn caused the breaking of the rocket and its play load which caused the failure of this mission. Two months later, the spacecraft fell back to Earth, according to The Guardian.
- Mars 2
A man-made spacecraft named Mars 2 was the first Soviet lander to touch the surface of the Red planet, but unfortunately it got separated from its orbiter after its braking rockets separated from it on landing.
- Mars 3
The third craft launched by the Soviet Union called Mar 3 landed on Mars' surface successfully. It even transmitted a 20-second video from the planet, but was followed by the loss of signal. The researchers were not able to fetch the beneficial data from the recording.
- Mars 6
In March 1974, a lander was released by the Mars 6 orbiter. The information was transmitted by the Soviet robot, but it failed prior its landing on Mars.
- Mars 7
Mars 7 orbiter was sent to Mars in 1974 after the failure of Mars 6 mission. This lander didn't make it to Mars and is presently orbiting around the Sun instead.
- Mars 96
In the November of 1996, the Russian spacecraft Mars 96 was devised with the aim of carrying two landers to the Red planet. This spacecraft unfortunately fell into the South Pacific Ocean along with 270 grams of plutonium after it entered the Earth's orbit.
- Mars Climate Orbiter
The Mars Climate Orbiter was the first spacecraft devised to analyse an alien planet's weather, which was Mars in this case. Students of planetary exploration had used this aircraft for case study in those days. In 1999, the spacecraft ended up exploding due to an error in its software.
- Mars Polar Lander
This lander belonged to the US-origin and was scheduled to land on Mars in December of 1999. The contact with this craft was lost by the mission controllers and it was found that the lander had shut down its engine a bit too early. The engine shut down was followed by the destruction of the engine because of the impact.
- Beagle 2
Beagle 2 was a UK devised lander, which was released in December 2003 from the European Mars Express Orbiter. It was expected to land on Mars on December 25, 2003. The contact with this spacecraft was lost too just like the Schiaparelli Mars lander. The images of this Beagle 2 were captured by NASA around a decade later, these snaps showed the spacecraft lying on Mars' surface as a whole. Improper opening of its solar panels led to this failure.
