NASA reviewing its Mars programme

quot;It is conceivable that we will completely change our approach,quot; NASA administrator Dan Goldin said, adding quot;clearly something is wrong, and we have to understand it.quot;

Loss of the polar lander is quot;a crushing blow for the mars programme,quot; NASA8217;s associate administrator Edward Weiler admitted.

Meanwhile, at NASA8217;s jet propulsion labortory in Pasadena, California, operations manager Richard Cook told reporters that his flight team had quot;played its last acequot; in trying to reach the spindly three-legged craft.

Critics have accused NASA of trying to do too much with too little money with its quot;faster, better, cheaperquot; approach in which smaller and less expensive probes are launched more often than in the past. The policy was started after the 1993 disappearance of the one-billion-dollar mars observer.