Mission Type: Flyby Launch Vehicle: 8K78 (no. T103-16) Launch
Site: NIIP-5 / launch site 1 Spacecraft Mass: 893.5 kg
Spacecraft Instruments: 1) imaging system and 2) magnetometer
Spacecraft Dimensions: 3.3 m long and 1.0 m in diameter (4 m
across with the solar panels and radiators deployed) Deep Space
Chronicle: A Chronology of Deep Space and Planetary Probes
1958-2000, Monographs in Aerospace History No. 24, by Asif A.
Siddiqi National Space Science Data Center,
http://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/ The second of three Soviet
spacecraft intended for the 1962 Mars launch window, Mars 1 was
the first spacecraft sent by any nation to fly past Mars. Its
primary mission was to photograph the surface. This time the
upper stage successfully fired the probe toward Mars, but
immediately after engine cutoff, controllers discovered that
pressure in one of the nitrogen gas bottles for the spacecraft's
attitude-control system had dropped to zero (due to incomplete
closure of a valve). On 6 and 7 November 1962, controllers used
a