The Venus Orbviter Akatsuki, taht should have entered orbit this tuesday, missed the orbit while in safe-mode. It is now heading for the Sun, where it will burn up as a small man-made comet

JAXA found that we have failed to inject the Venus Climate Orbiter "AKATSUKI" into the planned Venus orbit after conducting the Venus orbit insertion maneuver (VOI-1) on December 7.

While JAXA set up a new investigation team to study the cause and countermeasures, they will also review the Venus orbit injection plan again, to take the next opportunity in six years when the AKATSUKI flies closest to Venus.

"Akatsuki was an ambitious project considering the price. For years our budget has been at about the same level. Unless we get more funding it will not be enough to increase our activities and we will be soon overtaken by China and India." said Makoto Miwada, from JAXA.

Source: JAXA