NASA Officially Ends the MAVEN Mission Months After Losing Contact With the Mars Orbiter

The agency last heard from the spacecraft on December 6. Recovered fragmentary data suggest that MAVEN was spinning unexpectedly, hinting at a change in its trajectory and draining its batteries

Sara Hashemi | Daily Correspondent

June 4, 2026 2:51 p.m.

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On June 3, NASA officially said goodbye to its Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution, or MAVEN, orbiter. The spacecraft spent more than a decade circling the Red Planet, gathering data on its atmosphere to help scientists understand how its gases may have escaped into space over time.

MAVEN’s journey came to an unexpected halt in late 2025. NASA last received a transmission on December 6, just before it flew behind Mars, relative to Earth. When it reemerged, the agency could no longer establish contact with the orbiter.

In February, NASA formed a review board to evaluate recovery efforts. Fragmentary data obtained in December showed that MAVEN had switched to safe mode and was unexpectedly rotating at “an unusually high rate,” according to a statement.

The rotation meant that MAVEN’s orbit trajectory had changed, and it drained the probe’s batteries. Ultimately, that’s what caused its communications system to power down, the review board found. NASA spent months trying to reestablish contact with the spacecraft, but the agency finally decided that it was unrecoverable.

The review board is still trying to determine the root cause of the failure, said Mike Moreau, MAVEN project manager at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, during a June 3 news conference. They will also determine if there could be potential problems for other NASA missions that use equipment similar to that in MAVEN and “document lessons learned.”

MAVEN launched in November 2013 and reached the Red Planet in September 2014, originally geared up for a one-year mission. In its more than 11 years there, the spacecraft did more than help scientists study the erosion of Mars’ atmosphere. Its data led to the discovery of new types of auroras, and the probe observed the sun’s charged particles flowing to Mars as well as global dust storms on the planet. MAVEN even snapped ultraviolet images of our recent interstellar guest, comet 3I/ATLAS, which will help scientists study what the visitor is made of.

According to NASA, MAVEN’s science team has produced more than 800 publications.

“The team is certainly broken up about this,” said Shannon Curry, the mission’s principal investigator and a planetary scientist at the University of Colorado Boulder, at the news conference. “But at the same time, we are incredibly proud of the science we’ve accomplished over the last decade.”

This farewell is not the end of the orbiter’s scientific contributions—its datasets will continue to inform new research for years to come, says Louise Prockter, the director of the Planetary Science Division at NASA Headquarters, in the statement.

MAVEN was a critical part of a constellation of five instruments known as the Mars Relay Network, which sends data from Martian rovers, like Curiosity and Perseverance, to Earth. There have been some adjustments to rover operations to make up for MAVEN’s loss, but they are not expected to affect scientific output, said Greg Heckler, the deputy program manager for capability development within NASA’s Space Communications and Navigation Program, at the news conference.

“The Mars Relay Network is resilient enough at this point in time to accommodate, for the most part, the loss of MAVEN,” added Tiffany Morgan, the director of NASA’s Mars exploration program.

The retired spacecraft will continue to loop around Mars for the next 50 to 100 years, Moreau said. Eventually, its orbit will degrade, and it will burn up in the Martian atmosphere. “I think the team really has experienced the loss of a loved one with the end of the mission,” he noted.  

When asked what the team would put on MAVEN’s tombstone, Curry answered: “Best. Mars. Mission. Ever.”

Sara Hashemi | Read More

Sara Hashemi is a science writer and fact-checker currently based in New York City. Her work has appeared in Sierra, The Body, Maisonneuve magazine and more.