NASA said that its Dawn probe will remain in its current orbit around the dwarf planet Ceres, as the experts work out a software glitch. The probe has to be in the holding position for more time than being planned. Engineers want to know the reason that led the probe enter into a ‘safe mode’ last week.

On June 30, when Dawn fired up its ion engines to move down towards its third science orbit of the planet, the spacecraft’s software found a problem and owing to it, Dawn shut off its engine and went to safety mode.

Mission team members led the probe back from the safe mode and now, it is running properly. “Dawn will remain at its current orbital altitude until the operations team has completed an analysis of what occurred and has updated the flight plan”, affirmed NASA officials.

In September 2007, the mission was launched with an aim to study Vesta and Ceres, the largest objects in the main asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter. Dawn has already visited Vesta from July 2011 to September 2012 and in March, it reached at Ceres.

The Dawn orbits Ceres at a distance of 2,700 miles and the third science orbit is present 900 miles from Ceres. As per the early plans, Dawn was slated to reach the third orbit in early August. In the fourth orbit, Dawn will able to monitor Ceres from just 230 miles away.