By Sam Tabahriti
LONDON (Reuters) – The British arm of Airbus has won a 150 million pound ($194 million) contract from the European Space Agency to build the landing platform for the first British-made rover set to touch down on Mars in 2030.
The Rosalind Franklin rover, built between 2018 and 2019 by Airbus engineers in Britain, had its September 2022 departure for the red planet aborted due to the cancellation of its Russian rocket ride as a result of the Ukraine conflict.
Britain said the UK Space Agency worked alongside global partners to substitute Russian components, including the landing platform which, following the award of the contract, will be built at Airbus’s facility in Stevenage, south east England.
Airbus engineers will design the mechanical, thermal and propulsion systems for the 2030 rover landing, set to launch in 2028.
“This inspiring example of world-class British science will bring us one step closer to answering long-asked questions on potential life on Mars,” technology minister Peter Kyle said in a statement on Saturday.
The rover is tasked with exploring Mars and drilling as deep as two meters (6.56 ft) into the ground to search for evidence of past life, including fossilised microbes. It will be the first European-made rover to land on Mars, the statement said.
The United States was the last nation to send a rover to Mars in 2021, when NASA’s Perseverance collected samples confirming the existence of ancient lake sediments.
($1 = 0.7727 pounds)
(Reporting by Sam Tabahriti; editing by Sarah Young)
