The Russian space agency, Roskosmos, has decided to postpone the launch of a mission to the Martian moon Phobos from 2009 to 2011, according to a U.S. scientist involved in the first Russian-led interplanetary mission in more than a decade.
The Phobos-Grunt mission had been slated to lift off aboard a Zenit rocket in October on a three-year mission to study Phobos and return rock and soil samples to Earth. The rocket also was to carry a Mars orbiter contributed by China.