Beagle found on Mars

 

This is what it should have looked like. A tiny series of platelets no bigger than a dustbin lid flattened against the reddish dust of Mars, gathering sunlight and sending back juicy data.

It was the mission that inspired a generation and we thought it had been lost for ever. But now it has been discovered by scientists operating a camera on NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO).

Beagle 2 - named after Darwin's exploration ship - hitched a ride on ESA's Mars Express orbiter as the only robot up to that time designed specifically to look for signs of life on the red planet.

It left the mother craft on 19 December 2003 and was on course to land on the Martian surface on Christmas Day but in the end sent no signal back.
   
In February 2004, after two months of attempts to make contact, the project's scientists and engineers led by Prof Pillinger of the Open University, finally accepted their mission was lost.

Beagle 2 was planned to hit the thin Martian atmosphere at 13,000 mph and mission scientists favoured the theory that a freak thinning of the atmosphere caused the lander to go in too fast.

They thought the craft may have burned up in the atmosphere, its parachute could have failed or become entangled, or the shock-absorbing air bags may have under performed.

As Editor of Spaceflight magazine at the time I wrote about the inspirational British programme on many occasions and interviewed the late Prof Colin Pillinger about its fate.

At a press conference in London in May 2004, Prof Pillinger (pictured below) told me that it could also have been something as simple as a failed transistor or a piece of wiring. It turns out he might not have been far from wrong.

Prof Pillinger at the May 2004 press conference

Of course, the ever-optimistic Prof Pillinger was always of the view that one day the tiny craft created and built in British laboratories and cheekily flown piggyback on a European space probe would be discovered.

So, at an eagerly anticipated press conference organised by the UK Space Agency (UKSA) today, a new and perhaps final chapter was written in the story of the first British mission to Mars.

It was all made possible by an instrument known in NASA-speak as ‘HiRise’ on MRO, the only camera in Mars orbit that can image the surface in high enough detail to spot missing spacecraft.

It has already found the twin Viking landers, which touched down on Mars in the 1970s, and photographed Nasa's Phoenix, Curiosity and Opportunity rovers. The team had been actively hunting for Beagle 2 for several years.
   
"HiRise is the only camera at Mars that can see former spacecraft like Beagle 2,” said Shane Byrne, a scientist on the HiRise team at the University of Arizona. “It's definitely pretty close to its intended landing spot, no matter what. It entered the atmosphere at the right time and place.”

Designed to look for signs of life on Mars, Beagle 2 carried a drilling instrument to poke beneath the surface. Its release from Mars Express went smoothly, placing Beagle 2 on course for a landing site at Isidis Planitia, a huge plain near the Martian equator.

The lander deployed a parachute on its way down to the Martian surface and inflated triple air bags at the last minute to cushion the impact.

Rumours that remnants of the lander had been found were sparked at the beginning of this week when the UKSA scheduled a press conference to announce an unexpected “update” on Beagle 2.

Dr David Parker, UKSA chief executive, opened the packed press conference in London by confirming what we pretty much already knew by then - that Beagle 2 is “no longer lost”.

He said: “We are not looking at a crash site. The new images show good evidence of Beagle 2 resting on Mars. They are consistent with the spacecraft having landed on the planet’s surface.”

Alvaro Giménez, ESA’s director of science and robotic exploration, described how not knowing what happened to Beagle 2 had been a nagging worry.

“We are very happy to learn that Beagle 2 touched down on Mars,” he said. “The dedication of the various teams in studying high-resolution images in order to find the lander is inspiring.”

The images were initially searched by Michael Croon, a former member of the Mars Express operations team at ESA’s Space Operations Centre, ESOC, in Darmstadt, Germany, working in parallel with members of the Beagle 2 industrial and scientific teams.

The small size of Beagle 2 – less than 2 m across when fully deployed – meant this was a painstaking endeavour, right at the limit of the resolution of the camera technology.

After the identification of potential parts of Beagle 2 in the expected landing further images were obtained and analysed by the camera team, the Beagle 2 team and NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

They show the lander in what appears to be a partially deployed configuration, with only one, two or at most three of the four solar panels open, and with the main parachute and what is thought to be the rear cover with its pilot/drogue parachute still attached close by.

“The size, shape, colour and separation of the features are consistent with Beagle 2 and its landing components, and lie within the expected landing area at a distance of about 5 km from its centre,” said Prof Mark Simms, of Leicester University.

Pictures of such a lost lander are of huge interest to space scientists in helping them plan future missions to Mars, such as ESA's Exomars mission, which is due to launch in 2018 and land the year after.

“Beagle 2 was very much more of a success than we previously knew,” added Dr Parker. “The history books will now have to be slightly re-written to say Beagle 2 did land on Mars on Christmas Day 2003.”

In the final analysis, scientists admit that it is frustrating that such an ambitious mission came so much closer than we all thought to realising its aims - but that is the nature of space exploration.

Sadly, the discovery of Beagle 2 came just too late for Prof Pillinger who died last May without ever knowing what really happened.

With mutton-chop whiskers, an eccentric choice of clothes and distinctive west country burr, he was a natural enthusiast and the epitome of a scientist. He would have been overjoyed at today’s announcement.

Blog post by Clive Simpson, Editor of Spaceflight magazine 2001-2011 and now working as a freelance journalist

Failure is not an option

Photo: Clive Simpson

Many of the most successful people have experienced their fair share of failure before going on to do great things.And international businessman Mike Greene would count himself as one of them.

Born and raised on council estates, he worked hard to achieve a financially rewarding career after overcoming bankruptcy at the age of 27. Now, he’s a well-known business entrepreneur and angel investor, and a director of companies, trade associations, charities, marketing and retail organisations.

Mike greets me enthusiastically when I arrive at his family home in the heart of the South Lincolnshire Fens.As we chat whilst sitting at a large farmhouse table in the family’s garden conservatory on a fine summer’s afternoon it soon becomes evident that Peterborough’s very own Secret Millionaire is a man with a mission.

And, if there are any secrets when it comes to success in business and life, then here might be some answers.His appearance on Channel 4's Secret Millionaire programme in October 2011 was a life-transforming experience."It really consolidated my thinking about my past and its effect on what I have subsequently achieved," he says.

In the programme he became involved with various organisations working with underprivileged youngsters in Peterborough."It was a deeply moving experience and I was affected by how selfless some people can be in giving so much of their time and emotion to these causes."

But it was the kids themselves who proved the real eye-opener."Most of them had a really tough start in their lives and all of them had some real challenges to contend with. However, the ways in which they chose to deal with them were very different."

Afterwards Mike sold his main business and took a three month sabbatical during which he worked to raise £100,000 for a hundred charities in a hundred days.

The television programme and subsequent challenge inspired him to commit one-third of his time to helping charities and mentoring others to help change their lives for the better.

"We live in an instant world and too often we want a quick fix," he observes."The National Lottery and programmes like X-Factor lead a lot of people to believe that we can get rich quick without hard work - but life isn’t like that."

Mike’s own journey to fame and fortune stemmed from humble beginnings.His father abandoned the family when Mike was just a few years old, leading to eviction and living in an old people’s home before being re-housed in cramped, rented accommodation.

"It wasn’t until the family moved to Peterborough when I was 11 that I finally got a bed to myself and no longer had to share with my siblings," he says.

"Despite the tough early years I always swore that I would be a successful businessman. Even as a young boy I told my mother that one day I would be a millionaire. And I really believed it."

Today, Mike is living proof of his own mantra - ‘It's not where you start that matters, it's where you end up’.He’s a respected global retail consultant, an international speaker, a professional mentor, a philanthropist, an endurance adventurer, and a passionate charity fund raiser.

Above all he is a dedicated family man, with wife Julia and their two daughters, who were part of the motivation for writing his best selling and inspirational book Failure Breeds Success.

In a nutshell his book guides the reader through a series of steps to define what success means - in all its definitions - to them personally.

For Mike, life and business are inextricably connected. And whether its mentoring enthusiastic young entrepreneurs or speaking to groups of several hundred he doesn’t pull any punches."People spend more time planning their next holiday then they do the rest of the their life," he says.

Mike currently supports a number of charities in the Peterborough area, has around 20 investments in start up businesses and is on nine boards, five of which he chairs.

"I think I've got just about a perfect balance," he says. "It's about as close as I can get it to a third of my life being personal and family time, a third work and a third charity. I'm still a 16 hour a day person - but it's a really balanced 16 hours."

Largely because of his own life experiences, Mike still has something of a fascination with failure and turning the negative into something good.

"I have long harboured the notion that failure is not a bad thing. In fact, it is a very important part of our life journey," he says.

"Failure teaches you some of the most important lessons you will ever learn and if you are attuned to these lessons you will emerge a stronger, wiser and more resilient person - and be equipped with all the ingredients for success."

His ambition is to help others achieve their goals by sharing his stories and experiences through inspirational public speaking, and personal and professional mentoring.

It is evident from our conversation that Mike is a great believer in practising what he preaches. "You should live the life that you want to talk about and you should be the success that you advise on," he says.

And the strapline that underpins it all? "Businesses need to be more charitable and charities need to be more business-like," he replies.

We could have chatted for longer but I realised time was pressing and I now had my own goals to set and a strategy to plan. It was one of those inspirational interviews. And I left with what Mike likes to call his business card - a copy of his book Failure Breeds Success.


The above is adapted from ‘A clear vision’ - an article written by Clive Simpson for The Business Moment magazine. Mike Greene's book Failure Breeds Success is available from Amazon in paperback or Kindle