Scientific Critiques
Barry E. DiGregorio, Director of the International Committee Against Mars Sample Return (ICAMSR), criticised the LIFE experiment carried by Fobos-Grunt as a violation of the Outer Space Treaty due to the possibility of contamination of Phobos or Mars with the microbial spores and live bacteria it contains should it have lost control and crash-landed on either body. It is speculated that the heat-resistant extremophile bacteria could survive such a crash, on the basis that Microbispora bacteria survived the Space Shuttle Columbia disaster.
According to Fobos-Grunt Chief Designer Maksim Martynov, the probability of the probe accidentally reaching the surface of Mars was much lower than the maximum specified for Category III missions, the type assigned to Fobos-Grunt and defined in COSPAR's planetary protection policy (in accordance with Article IX of the Outer Space Treaty).
Read more about this topic: Fobos-Grunt
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“Men, forever tempted to lift the veil of the future—with the aid of computers or horoscopes or the intestines of sacrificial animals—have a worse record to show in these “sciences” than in almost any scientific endeavor.”
—Hannah Arendt (1906–1975)