spacetoday.net: ExoMars launch postponed to March

Posted: Sat, Sep 26, 2015, 10:36 AM ET (1436 GMT)
ExoMars orbiter and EDL demonstrator (ESA)

The European Space Agency said faulty components will force it to delay the launch of its ExoMars mission from January to March of 2016. ESA said it will remove a pair of pressure transducers in an entry, descent, and landing demonstrator that will be carried to Mars with the ExoMars orbiter. The demonstrator is designed to test landing technologies for the future ExoMars lander mission. Removing the faulty components will force the launch, on a Russian Proton rocket, to shift to March, but the spacecraft will still arrive at Mars in October as previously planned. The faulty components are part of a defective batch that also affects several other ESA missions, although none of the other missions are facing launch delays as a result.