14 DAY TRIAL // You must be thinking that the poor lander has been pronounced dead several times now and you're right to some extent. The difference is that, this time, it's for good. Although hopes for any sign of communication with the brave lander were extremely low, NASA technicians still made a few more attempts to listen to any hint of Phoenix' coming back to life, even briefly, but now, after a month, they decided to let it go, given the worsening weather conditions and the conjunction of the planets.
Up to now, daily attempts have been made in order to hail Phoenix using Martian orbiter probes and listen to any response beep, but all the efforts were in vain. The lander's power that kept it alive and operating for much longer than previously expected at the beginning of its mission is now literally gone. The last signal received from the device was a faint one depicted by the Mars Odyssey orbiter on November 2nd.
"The variability of the Martian weather was a contributing factor to our loss of communications, and we were hoping that another variation in weather might give us an opportunity to contact the lander again," explained Chris Lewicki, manager of the Phoenix Mission from NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, as the official site reveals. Also, the fact that the Sun is now located near the straight line from Mars to Earth drastically decreases the chances for communication.
The final (failed) communication effort was made Saturday, November 29th at 3:49pm PST (or 4:26pm local Mars solar time, during the 182nd Martian day – called sol – since Phoenix landed), as the Odyssey orbiter passed high above Phoenix. The solar conjunction period will end sometime in mid-December, but the temperature will be even colder and the sunlight even more scarce in that region of Mars, further preventing any communication process. That's why it's now safe to assume that the lander is officially dead.