It was designed to survive the tough impact when descending onto Mars The whole concept of the landing system was absolutely fascinating First a specially tailored parachute would be deployed to slow down the lander in the Martian atmosphere Then after a short while a set of retro rockets would kick in to help it touch down gently It was a carefully orchestrated sequence Sadly not long after Mars 3 landed it suddenly lost contact with the base But the USSR which sent the spacecraft didn’t lose hope They had gained a wealth of scientific knowledge and technological advancement from their Mars missions and they were determined to continue exploring Besides wanting to outshine the United States the Soviets had another agenda They were on a quest to unravel the mystery of aliens living on Mars The Martian rover on board wasn’t just equipped to study soil and weather conditions it was also designed to search for signs of life When Mars 3 transmitted the first ever live image from Mars it was a monumental moment Although the image showed only a grey background it was still an incredible breakthrough Detecting aliens or anything specific from such an image was practically impossible but for the Soviet Union it was a chip on their shoulder They knew they were pioneers in the exploration of the unknown As thrilling an adventure as this was for the Soviet Union something shocking happened after the landing The Mars 3 spacecraft which was transmitting data back to Earth suddenly went silent after only 15 seconds Nobody knew what had caused this abrupt break in transmission and the device never turned back on It was a tragic end to what could have been a splendid mission
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