The people running the Beagle 2 program had absolutely no idea what they were doing. That's because the program was an eleventh-hour political push from the very beginning. Even securing lander capability for Mars Express was a choice made only after media hype and political pressure was applied. It was not included in the original mission plan. The project was driven by the misbegotten belief that a stationary lander is going to be able to find evidence of extant microbial life on the surface of Mars. It was a crapshoot in concept from the very beginning.
As for other British mission - more power to them. If ESA had let those British scientists and engineers who actually know what they are doing design, develop, build and send a lander to Mars (as opposed to an egotistical headline seeker), we might see the British on Mars today.
Space/Science » in reply to Another article about Beagle 2
Exactly on point
The whole thread (46 posts)
- Beage 2: As I was saying
- a portrait ..
- Predictions, anyone? How long before ESA offers competitive prizes like NASA now is?
- A Difference Overlooked
- David Whitehouse lurks the Habitable Zone.
- You know this for a fact?
- Another article about Beagle 2
- Exactly on point
- re: Exactly on point
- Standard practice is to design for the worst case scenario
- Importance of feedback from protypes
- re: Standard practice is to design for the worst case scenario
- Standard practice is to design for the worst case scenario
- re: Exactly on point
- Exactly on point
- don't hold your breath for a refund (n/t)
- Sounds like what they said about Mars Polar Lander. (n/t)
- Let the space organization that does not have at least one pile of multimillion dollar junk littering the Martian surface, cast the first stone. (n/t)
- re: Let the space organization that does not have at least one pile of multimillion dollar junk littering the Martian surface, cast the first stone.
- A big difference
- Yes, there are some differencess...
- re: A big difference
- re: Beagle 2 was 'too great a risk'
- You're missing the point
- re: You're missing the point
- How much extra would Beagle 2 have cost if they used the NASA airbag sytem?
- Many space scientists said MPL's landing system was doomed to failure BEFORE it arrived at Mars. (n/t)
- re: You're missing the point
- You might be right.
- A big difference
- re: Let the space organization that does not have at least one pile of multimillion dollar junk littering the Martian surface, cast the first stone.
- Let the space organization that does not have at least one pile of multimillion dollar junk littering the Martian surface, cast the first stone. (n/t)