“Roscosmos” reports that within preparation of the joint Russian-European mission “Eczemas-2020”, the developers conducted a low-altitude testing of the parachute system, which is planned to carry out a soft landing of the Russian scientific platform and the European Rover on the surface of Mars.
The tests took place in Sweden. They attention was given to the second basic parachute with a diameter of 35 meters. In the process of testing the simulator a landing module with a pre-installed system descent raised by helicopter to a height of 1.2 km above the Ground and dropped down. After reset was run the sequence of release of the main parachute. After 12 seconds, successfully deploy pilot chute, and then was powered off and the parachute. The system successfully demonstrated the opening of the parachute at negative air temperatures.
“The GoPro camera, mounted on 500-pound test simulator landing platform, exactly recorded all the stages of parachute deployment. The whole process of landing on the ground took about 2.5 minutes. After landing, the avionics simulator sent telemetry in real time,” reads the press release of Roskosmos.
The entire parachute system weighs 195 pounds, the weight of the parachute including the weight of five kilometers strop is 70 pounds. Packing a parachute experts had to spend three working days.
The spacecraft, which is to deliver the landing module to Mars scheduled to launch in 2020. The arrival of the spacecraft to Mars. is expected a year later. According to the plan, the landing module separated from the spacecraft before entering the planet’s atmosphere, which invokes the boarding process, which includes braking in the atmosphere, the disclosure of the parachute system, the ejection of the heat shield, the separation of the casing with the parachute and the inclusion of the heatshield. Clear out the landing it was decided to start in advance, in order to avoid the occurrence of emergency situations.
The project “Eczemas” is a joint project of Roskosmos and the European space Agency’s exploration of Mars, its surface, atmosphere, and climate from orbit and on the surface of the planet. It will open a new phase of space exploration to Russia and Europe.
“Roscosmos” experienced parachute for landing on Mars
Vyacheslav Larionov