Europe's Mars lander starts descent to red planet
European Space Agency (ESA)'s Schiaparelli Mars lander on Sunday separated from its mothership and began descent towards Mars' surface. It will test technologies for Europe's first Mars rover, which will launch in 2020 and search for signs of past and present life. The lander and its mothership make up the ExoMars 2016 mission, a collaboration between ESA and Russia's Roscosmos.