spacetoday.net: space news from around the webin association with SpaceNews


Report says Beagle 2 should have been canceled
Posted: Fri, Feb 4, 2005, 8:40 AM ET (1340 GMT)
Beagle 2 lander illustration (Beagle 2) Beagle 2, a British-built spacecraft that was lost trying to land on Mars in late 2003, was the product of a program so poorly run that the spacecraft should never have been launched, according to a report released Thursday. The report, a joint effort of ESA and the UK government, concluded that since the program was not fully funded from its inception, ESA should not have allowed the spacecraft to fly to Mars along with the agency's Mars Express orbiter. The report said that Beagle 2 was considered a "scientific instrument" and not a spacecraft in and of itself, and therefore did not get the funding and attention needed for a successful mission. The spacecraft, the report noted, was likely too complex a project to be led by a group at Open University. The report, however, did not identify a likely technical cause for the failure of the mission, only listing a number of scenarios ranging from technical flaws with the probe's landing system to a thinner-than-expected atmosphere that failed to sufficiently slow the entering probe. The report was completed last year but was not publicly released until yesterday, after the magazine New Scientist filed a request for the report under the UK's new Freedom of Information Act.
<<previous article   next article>>
news in brief
Starship explodes during preparations for static-fire test
Posted: Sun, Jun 22 6:52 AM ET (1052 GMT)

French government leads investment in Eutelsat
Posted: Sat, Jun 21 8:38 AM ET (1238 GMT)

NASA further delays Ax-4 launch
Posted: Sat, Jun 21 8:34 AM ET (1234 GMT)

news links
Monday, June 30
Blue Origin N-S 33 lifts off
KVIA-TV El Paso, TX — 5:39 am ET (0939 GMT)


about spacetoday.net   ·   info@spacetoday.net   ·   mailing list