Beagle spacecraft 'reaches Mars'

Scientists are awaiting confirmation that the �35m landed safely after a 400 million kilometre voyage which has taken six months.

Beagle 2's plunge through the thin atmosphere of Mars, slowed by parachutes and cushioned by airbags, is the most dangerous part of the mission.

If successful, it will begin a 180-day mission to search for signs of life.

Continued...

Just FYI, the sometimes cooky, sometimes sane Richard Hoagland will be on coast2coastam tonight to discuss the Beagle 2's landing.
I'm sure he'll try to put some good conspiracy spin on it.

The Beagle has Landed!

Oh I hope it talks to us...I don't want to hear about any dead Beagles on Mars.

Originally posted by Valhall
The Beagle has Landed!

Oh I hope it talks to us...I don't want to hear about any dead Beagles on Mars.

Darn!! Valhall beat me to it!!

@DClark: Yeah ya gotta love Richard Hoagland. I think he is "on" much more than he is "off".

Scientists have failed to pick up an expected signal from British-built spacecraft Beagle 2 telling them it has landed safely on Mars.
The �35m probe should have landed at 0254 GMT on Christmas Day after a 400 million kilometre, six-month flight.

Nasa's Mars Odyssey orbiter has since flown over its landing site but failed to detect the expected call sign.

The giant Jodrell Bank telescope, in Cheshire, UK, will come on line at about 2200 GMT to listen for signals.

Scientists are confident that sweep will pick up a signal from Beagle 2 - if it has made it to the planet surface in one piece and is functioning as expected.

If that option fails, the Nasa spacecraft will have a daily chance to pick up the signal until 3 January, when Europe's Mars Express craft - the mother ship now orbiting the planet - begins its mission.

However, if nothing has been received by the end of 26 December, hopes for Beagle 2 will start to fade.

Continued..

I'm so sad. The little Beagle hasn't barked

I was sure hoping for success on this for the Brits. Not just for them, but for all of us, because I felt this could really bring value info concerning Mars.

The Mars curse strikes again.

This craft has all kinds of good equipment to test for traces of life/organic material, it would really be a shame if it fails.

Maybe there are people up there and with their technology, no one is able to detect them and they shut off the beagle.

I think this dog won't hunt

www.cnn.com...

I feel so bad for the British scientists and engineers involved in this, and I am sad for all of us for what we missed.

Originally posted by Valhall
I'm so sad. The little Beagle hasn't barked

The great WWI flying ace has finally been shot down by that dasterly Red Baron? Oooh, what will Woodstock do now?

But seriously, how much money is the world going to launch at Mars before they take other actions? Like... sending orbital spy satilites to investigate why they are not working? Hey, if the CIA can watch me pick my nose with a pen cap from orbit, I am sure we can send something with that kind of quality/survallence over to Mars.

Spy satellites to MARS! All they are is a Hubble turned towards the Earth. Maybe some new school technology can propel it there. Next time we need to drop a bunch of landing probes. The US needs a success in the space game.

Uh Beagle was an ESA mission, not a NASA mission. The NASA rovers are still in transit, first one lands at the start of January.

As far as spy satellites, there are orbiters that are imaging Mars already, none of them have the resolution of current spy satellites as the weight restrictions are far far greater. Insterting a probe into mars orbit is a massively different proposition to just popping one up into low earth orbit.