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European Mars Probe, Beagle 2, To Land On Mars Soon!

I'm sure their things would WORK if they weren't built by companies who supplied the LOWEST bid to get the contract. QUALITY of workmanship counts for a lot nowadays - especially when it comes to space.

At ANY rate - NASA didn't have any input in this - it was the ESA (European Space Agency).


Courtesy of the Beagle 2 official website
A cardboard model of Beagle featured in early TV broadcasts. Johnny Vaughan, Channel 4 The Big Breakfast....

Vaughan: “It's only made of cardboard”

Pillinger: “British ingenuity”

Vaughan: “British ingenuity—the first to send a cardboard probe”

Pillinger: “Well when we get the budget we will make it out of something more substantial”
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...They obviously never got the budget.
:p
 
I never implied it was NASA that made the Beagle.

I was merely pointing out that it's not just NASA that makes things that don't work. At least we know we're not alone.
 
Originally posted by Juventuz
I never implied it was NASA that made the Beagle.

I was merely pointing out that it's not just NASA that makes things that don't work. At least we know we're not alone.
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Sorry - my bad...

:p

Anyway - NASA can really prove their worth when THEIR orbiters and landers come into play over the next few weeks....


Watch this space!

:rolleyes:
 
Originally posted by Stelliform
Mars does seem to have a disproportionate amount of failed missions. (that fail when they get close to Mars.)
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It's further away than any other body we've attempted to land on and there are a lot of guesses that go into making it work. Sending people there might give the lander the intelligence to succeed OR it might mean that a lander full of people end up dying. Imagine waiting to hear from the landing crew and a signal never comes...
 
Arg...

What they need is to point one of their frikken Telescopes up at the Mars and frikken search it.

Or get better frikken Satellites to track the Lander.

Come on, How can ou NOT find it?

:mad:
 
Europe hasn't successfully sent a monkey in a can into orbit, so how do they even expect to try to land on Mars? NASA has a split record on this, the ESA is 0 for 1. To catch up, Europe's gonna have to buy the Russian space program. Otherwise, even the Chinese have passed them by in space exploration.
 
If it is a communications problem then it is not over yet. The BBC reports the intensifying efforts to communicate with the lander. Of course it could easily be dead in a million pieces on the planet surface.

Mars Express, Beagle's mothership, will try to reach the lander in January.

Mars Odyssey carried out another flyby of Beagle's landing site on Wednesday, but again the craft received no signal from Beagle.

Beagle's onboard timer should tell it when 10 "passes", or attempts to contact it via Mars Odyssey and the radio telescope at Jodrell Bank, have been made.

Beagle should have taken the lack of contact after the tenth pass as its cue to start hailing Earth more frequently. This mode is known as communications search mode 1 (CSM 1). In this mode, Beagle tries to send a signal twice a day.
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Originally posted by Phil Of Mac
Europe hasn't successfully sent a monkey in a can into orbit, so how do they even expect to try to land on Mars? NASA has a split record on this, the ESA is 0 for 1. To catch up, Europe's gonna have to buy the Russian space program. Otherwise, even the Chinese have passed them by in space exploration.
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we'll let you do all the 'monkey in a can' stuff. The whole point of Beagle is that it cost practically nothing (well a few million but nothing in NASA terms;) ). It was essentially a free ride.

What's so great about sending people anyway? Probes are way cheaper. Lets look at it another way - Russian martian success is like 0 out of 16 or something. American Venus lander success - errrr that's zero too!!! We're pretty good at launching stuff into Earth orbit and we did that Giotto probe to Halleys comet a few years back. So we're not crap at this - it's just not a national pride thing like it is with you. We don't mind if someones space program is bigger than ours:rolleyes:
 
Japan is also having issues. JFK said it best concerning the Apollo program: "We choose to do these things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard".

The Mars Express - the mother ship of this project - is working fine, so the mission is not a total failure.

And the US is dropping one of its own landers on Saturday. Hopefully this one doesn't have the same problems.

D
 
Originally posted by caveman_uk
we'll let you do all the 'monkey in a can' stuff. The whole point of Beagle is that it cost practically nothing (well a few million but nothing in NASA terms;) ). It was essentially a free ride.

What's so great about sending people anyway? Probes are way cheaper.
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I totally agree with you about probes vs humans.

But to nitpick... the Beagle was $50 million US dollars. The Mars Express and launch vehicle to get it there costs more of course. The two rovers together plus the launch vehicles, etc, sent by NASA (to be landing soon) cost $500 million. The Beagle was an admirable attempt to quickly and cheaply get something to the surface. But NASA is not sending $5 billion Viking landers either anymore, and the Beagle was not a few million.

I hope the Beagle manages to be found. If not, the ball will probably swing back to more expensive missions. Even if it is cheaper to try several times with probes costing 10 times less, no country likes the publicity of space failures, even if their national ego is not tied to space as closely as the US.
 
Originally posted by Phil Of Mac
Which is why you haven't landed on the moon yet.
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And what exactly did you achieve with manned Lunar missions that automated ones couldn't? A few catchy phrases, a buggy and a few tons of rock. You could also get the rock remotely as Luna 24 showed in 1976.

The manned lunar missions were just a pissing contest with the Soviets. Whilst it was a enormous technological acheivement there really is no reason to send humans to do most tasks in space. It's an ego trip by and large. For all the money the US spends on manned trips think how much we could discover using probes...
 
sure, but something about the human spirit makes it so much more satisfying to send someone where no man has gone before (and of course bring him back safely)
 
Originally posted by Mr. Anderson
Japan is also having issues. JFK said it best concerning the Apollo program: "We choose to do these things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard".

The Mars Express - the mother ship of this project - is working fine, so the mission is not a total failure.

And the US is dropping one of its own landers on Saturday. Hopefully this one doesn't have the same problems.

D
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true but the landing techniques of both suck, come on bouncing electronics over and over in a high wind atmosphere??im surprised anything would work after taking 4 story bounces and then some more. stupid way to land a electronics package in my H.O.
Also win you put a person on the surface they can adjust examine change etc where a probe can only do whatever it was designed to do. a man is way more adapt to discover things then a stupid computer mated to a stupid machine. probes are good for somethings but suck at adapting or changing mission goals and objectives. we could have probed the hell out of the moon and never found the right rock where as a man can do so much more. im all for man exploration but first we need a good cost effective way to orbit and Nasa has not yet done that but what do you expect from a govt ran beaurcratic money wasting military directed orginazation.
 
I don't think being competitive with this is exactly appropriate. It would be nice if the Beagle2 is found in the next couple weeks - everyone will benefit here.

But its great to see NASA managed to get the first of the landers down safely. But after looking at the pics, its amazing how barren the crater is....not at all like the Pathfinder landing site.

D
 
Congratulations to NASA on the sucessful landing of Spirit. I wish them continued success. Looking forward to the PBS program at 8pm EST "Mars: Dead Or Alive" tonight.
 
Originally posted by caveman_uk
So we're not crap at this - it's just not a national pride thing like it is with you. We don't mind if someones space program is bigger than ours:rolleyes:
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Taking potshots at the other side is not a US only thing:

"In 2000, Pillinger pilloried the NASA rovers as "much less scientifically accomplished." Unlike them, he told a meeting of British scientists, "Beagle 2 won't be going sightseeing."

A little competitive jibe now and then is all in good fun, of course. From reports I've read, both groups have cooperated and given equipment and information to the other, which is refreshing. Although, there is "a prize" to be won... if there is life on Mars, finding evidence of it will be a historic accomplishment.
 
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