Did you know? A calculation error caused the loss of a 348 million US dollar spacecraft. NASA launched the Mars Climate Orbiter to orbit Mars. The spacecraft was built by Lockheed Martin. They configured the spacecraft to calculate the velocity in pound seconds but NASA programmed the spacecraft in newton seconds. This led to an offset by a factor of 5.5 and the spacecraft entered the Martian atmosphere at an altitude of 58 km, which was well below the 80 km mark where the Martian atmosphere starts.
Source: NASA, Everyday Astronaut
Source: NASA, Everyday Astronaut
