Recently, NASA announced that it will stop sending commands to any of the Mars probes until November 25, because of the positions of Mars, the Earth, and the Sun.
- From the Curiosity and Perseverance rovers to the Ingenuity Mars Helicopter and Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter and more, NASA has a veritable army of robots on the red planet or orbiting.
- Between November 11 and November 25, the Sun will be in between Earth and Mars.
Mars solar conjunction
- The phenomenon is called Mars solar conjunction and it happens once every two years.
- NASA is pausing communication because Sun expels hot, ionised gas from its corona and there is a chance that could corrupt radio signals sent from Earth to Mars.
- This could cause unexpected behaviour from the spacecraft on Mars.
