The Genesis spacecraft, a NASA mission designed to collect particles from the solar wind and bring them back to Earth for study, has crashed into the Utah desert. Apparently there were at least two problems, likely to be related: the craft was not correctly rotating so as to maintain its attitude during descent, and the parachutes that were supposed to break its fall never opened. The original plan was for a daring rescue in which stunt pilots would snag the vehicle as it fell to Earth. It’s not clear at the moment whether the samples will be able to be recovered; scientists are examining the craft carefully, as the parachutes may still be explosively deployed.