Mars Express launch today

mikerich writes "The European Space Agency and the Russian Space Agency will launch the Mars Express spaceprobe today using a Soyuz-Fregat out of Baikonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. Launch is scheduled for 17.45 UT (18.45 BST), so far all preparations have gone smoothly and the forecast is excellent. The launch will be streamed over the Web by ESA. Mars Express consists of two components, a large Martian orbiter which will be searching for sub-surface water and studying the Martian atmosphere. Its seven science packages have been built by teams from Europe, Russia, the United States, Japan, and China. Amongst the science packages is a radar for studying geological structures. Mars Express will map most of the planet in high-resolution colour stereoscopic 3D and perform a high-resolution mineralogical survey of the planet. Mars Express is also carrying the tiny Beagle 2 lander designed by a team led by Professor Colin Pillinger of the Open University. Beagle 2 is Britain's first planetary space probe and designed specifically to look for life using the most advanced techniques currently available. For those in the UK, the story of Beagle 2 is being told on BBC 2 on Monday 2nd June at 23:20." Dan B. writes "The BBC is running an article on the European 'Mars Express', Europe's first interplanetary rocket. This is the first of three probes heading to the Red Planet this Summer, as it nears it's closest point from the Earth in thousands of years."

Comments

Re:Beagle, ESA and .uk

[Jez]

Colin Pillinger was one of the originators of the "faster, cheaper, better" way of developing space probes. He had to be, because there's just no way that ESA could follow the NASA model of ever bigger, more expensive projects. I worked in his lab, back when Beagle2 and Cassini were just starting to be talked about. 2003 seemed so far off. It's amazing that it's actually here, and built, and ready to go.

Re:Beagle, ESA and .uk

[aallan]

A frugal scientist with twice as much funding may not be any more productive than a frugal scientist with his current budget.

Being a frugal British scientist working on a a tight budget I can tell you that while this may be true in some cases, just taking the stress of being so close to the wire away could mean that some people can get more science done. Heck I just blew the last three weeks writing grant proposals, very little science (or anything else, including sleep) got done during that time. For this I got a PhD?

Al.