The European Space Agency's tracking station at Perth, Australia has established contact with Russian's Phobos-Grunt spacecraft on Tuesday, Nov. 22, the first since the spacecraft was lost in Earth's orbit.

ESA said that on Nov. 22 its Perth station antenna was pointed toward the spacecraft's expected orbital position during 20:21-20:28 GMT, and telecommands provided by NPO Lavochkin were transmitted.

"Owing to its very low altitude, it was expected that our station would only have Phobos-Grunt in view for six to ten minutes during each orbit, and the fast overhead pass introduced large variations in the signal frequency," said Wolfgang Hell, the Phobos-Grunt Service Manager at ESOC.

The attempt to establish contact was a success as the signals commanded the spacecraft's transmitter to switch on, and sent a signal down to the station's 15 m dish antenna, ESA said.

The data received from Phobos-Grunt were then transmitted to Russian mission controllers via ESA's Space Operations Centre, Darmstadt, Germany, for analysis.

The ESA teams are now working closely with Russian controllers to determine how best to maintain communication with their spacecraft. ESA said additional communication slots are available on 23 November at 20:21-20:28 GMT and 21:53-22:03 GMT, and

ESA attempted to contact the Phobos probe since Nov. 9 upon the request from NPO Lavochkin, operator of the mission on behalf of Roscosmos, the Russian space agency. Before Nov. 22, ESA's daily attempts to contact the probe using numerous configurations and radio links were to no avail.

However, even if control of the spacecraft is reestablsihed, it remains unclear if the mission will continue as planned as the launch window for the Mars moon mission was closed Monday.