Beagle 2 found by MRO/HIRISE. Options

[djellison]

My animation is NOT accurate. It was made as a student project 15 years ago, long before the Beagle 2 design was finalized.

Is this the first ever shot HIRISE image of the area?

It really is very trivial to find HiRISE images. You could go to https://hirise.lpl.arizona.edu/ and search for Beagle ( 28 images )

You could load Google Earth, switch to Mars mode and turn on the HiRISE layer and find them there

You could even just google for HiRISE Beagle 2 - take the first hit - http://hirise.lpl.arizona.edu/ESP_039308_1915 and read the text which explicitly states...

Since the loss of Beagle 2 following its landing timed for 25th December 2003 a search for it has been underway using images taken by HiRISE camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO). HiRISE has been taking occasional pictures of the landing site in addition to pursuing its scientific studies of the surface of Mars. The planned landing area for Beagle 2 at the time of launch was approximately 170 x 100 kilometers (105 x 62 miles) within Isidis Planitia. With a fully deployed Beagle 2 being less than a few meters across and a camera image scale of about 0.3 m (10 inches), detection is a very difficult and a painstaking task. The initial detection came from HiRISE images taken on 28 February 2013 and 29 June 2014 (see images ESP_030908_1915 and ESP_037145_1915).

[mcgyver]

My animation is NOT accurate. It was made as a student project 15 years ago, long before the Beagle 2 design was finalized.

But it's very funny in the final part!

[PDP8E]

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.

[djellison]

I'm afriad you're somehwat off on the main chute...and you've missed the backshell and drogue chute to the south. I wouldn't use the recent color image when feature hunting - I've personally found ESP_037145_1915 to be about the best.

Here's my best estimation... the bright feature to the north could be either the heatshield interior or maybe the clamp band, I would not expect airbags to exhibit specularity as that feature does. I also wouldn't expect any hint of boucne marks. Try finding them at Gusev or Meridiani after 11 years.

The backshell and drogue chute, the main chute, and Beagle 2 itself are pretty much no-brainers at this point.

Attached thumbnail(s)

 

[tanjent]

With the evident partial deployment of its solar panels, would Beagle II have lacked sufficient power even to communicate locally with MEX or one of the other two orbiters?

It is very painful to consider that perhaps there was absolutely nothing else wrong with it. Maybe no more than a badly-placed stone blocking the unfolding process...

[djellison]

It's not a power issue - it's the UHF antenna being obscured by one or more of the solar panels. The UHF antenna was under all 4 panels. Without them deploying.....the UHF antenna can't 'see' the sky - and a carbon composite solar panel covered in silicon and wires is a very good way to block UHF signals.

[tim53]

I am curious: why did it take so long to find Beagle2 if it is within the planned landing ellipse? Is this the first ever shot HIRISE image of the area?

There is a MOC image footprint over the lander, taken several months after the loss, IIRC. But the image was not received on Earth.

-Tim.

[TheAnt]

It is very painful to consider that perhaps there was absolutely nothing else wrong with it. Maybe no more than a badly-placed stone blocking the unfolding process...

Yes that's what I was thinking also when we got to see this image, most landers stand on a platform with legs.
Beagle2 was a gamble where such had been removed to save weight on one "economy sized" lander. Even so UK can now claim to actually have managed a soft, though bouncing landing on Mars.

[djellison]

most landers stand on a platform with legs.

Not really. Of the 8 'successful' landers (I include Beagle 2) - 4 landed on airbags, three with legs, one on its wheels.

For MER and MPF, by virtue of their airbags, they ended up rolling roughly to a stop in a flat enough place for initial deployments. I would expect B2 to have done something similar, but realistically, who knows.

[vikingmars]

.../... Long Lat - 90.4295E 11.5265N

Dear Phil, could you infer, please, from the precise location of Beagle 2 the altitude of the landing site ?
Thanks so much in advance ! VM

[djellison]

It's approx -3748m according to Google Earth.

[vikingmars]

It's approx -3748m according to Google Earth.

Thanks so much Doug

[djellison]

The 3rd HiRISE image is now out

http://hirise.lpl.arizona.edu/ESP_039308_1915

[nprev]

Tantalizing. There seems to be ALMOST enough resolution to get data enough to constrain possible failure modes. Does anyone know if the UK space agency is trying to do such 'forensics'?

[DoF]

One thing I'd like to know is whether Beagle 2 could theoretically still be functional. With a partial deployment there would be some electrical power available I'd assume, so isn't it possible in theory that its still humming along, keeping warm with its heaters? Admittedly it has already spent a long time on the surface, much longer than its intended mission lifetime. It also depends on exactly how the thermal control is implemented and how much electrical power is actually available in the state it is. Without a way to communicate with the probe it isn't like it matters either, it's simply a matter of curiosity.