Russian Phobos-Grunt Spacecraft Due Back To Earth Next Week - VIDEO

Crash Landing: Russian Phobos-Grunt Spacecraft Due Back To Earth

It hasn't been a great run for the Russian Phobos-Grunt spacecraft.

First its solar panels opened facing the wrong way, dooming its navigation system immediately.

Now it's going to unceremoniously crash to earth having failed its mission of gathering samples from the Mars moon it's named for.

The Telegraph reports that the Russian space Agency Roscosmos has predicted the Phobos-"Ground" will land in the Indian Ocean near Madagascar on either Sunday or Monday.

Phobos-Grunt launched on November 18 2011 on a Zenit 2SB Rocket.

Once the rocket reached the "Low Earth Parking Orbit", further burners were meant to kick it out into space in an eliptical orbit of earth, before another burner would have taken it on to Phobos.

Neither of the two rocket burns worked, so the Phobos-Grunt stayed stuck in Earth's orbit.

Despite speculation, no-one knows quite where the Phobos-Grunt will land, though the powers that be have issued the standard "it's unlikely to hit anyone" type warning.

The unlucky mission cost Russia million of dollars, and despite not being used, its instruments are expected to burn up on re-entry like a high tech mandala.

Stay tuned for more rocket crash news right here on Huffington Post UK. Enjoy the spooky theramin in the video above.

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