Beagle 2 found by MRO/HIRISE. |
Beagle 2 found by MRO/HIRISE. |
Jan 12 2015, 10:30 PM
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Member Group: Members Posts: 282 Joined: 18-June 04 Member No.: 84 |
Friday 16th January
http://www.theguardian.com/science/2015/ja...MP=share_btn_tw QUOTE A British Mars lander that was lost on its way to the red planet more than a decade ago may have been spotted by an orbiting spacecraft.
The Beagle 2 lander was supposed to touch down on Christmas day in 2003, but after it was released from its mothership, Mars Express, the dustbin-lid-sized craft was never heard from again. But Beagle 2’s final resting place may finally have been discovered. Scientists operating the HiRise camera on Nasa’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) will take part in a press conference this Friday to announce “an update” on the ill-fated mission. |
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Jan 20 2015, 03:32 AM
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Member Group: Members Posts: 808 Joined: 10-October 06 From: Maynard Mass USA Member No.: 1241 |
busy busy week ...wish I had more time to work on this ...
MCGYVER: inspecting just one HiRise image at a scale of 1.0 is exhausting ( ~1 to 2 billion pixels ) Beagle was in only 3 of 28 of images (and only 2 until a few weeks ago in December 2014) Just one second of distraction and you miss it. Forget the other 25 images that Beagle is not in frame. The people who found it are amazing. And Beagle is small !! Here is a little update on the color Beagle frame. The drogue pulls the back-shell away (not sure about the heat-shield ejection.. but from MSL we know it can 'frisbee' away) The main chute comes out and a 'bridle' lowers Beagle and the air bags deploy around Beagle On touch-down the main chute is cut, and the airbags roll off until they stop. Beagle then deploys. Here is what I postulate as the back-shell ( the drogue is too small and old (12 years) to see) Emily's recent Blog demonstrates how the main chute is a gossamer of thin material,and how hard it be to would see, especially with the ground it sits upon (and never mind the 12 years of dust on top of both the main and the smaller dogue chute) There are also a few more heat-shield candidates within a few hundred meters of Beagle (example: one about 60 meters to the southwest of what identify as the back-shell). The 'official' heat-shield may be might be too far away (who knows...) I also did a quick inventory of 'rocks and boulders' within 300 meters of Beagle, and what I call the back-shield stands out ( the immediate area is rock/boulder poor) The initially identified thing as a 'parachute' is too big and too bright to be the the 'drogue' and too far away from Beagle to the the main chute. I suspect it is a rock ? As always...your mileage may vary. -------------------- CLA CLL
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