NASA Satellite's Dirt-Mapping Radar Bites the Dust

One of the two science instruments aboard a NASA Earth-observing satellite that launched earlier this year has failed, agency officials say. The radar instrument on NASA's $916 million Soil Moisture Active Passive (SMAP) spacecraft stopped returning data on July 7, a few months after the satellite began its science mission. The SMAP team has been unable to bring the instrument back online despite multiple attempts, and now views its recovery as unlikely.