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

The search

[Timesprout]

Beagle 2 is Britain's first planetary space probe and designed specifically to look for life using the most advanced techniques currently available.

In the best British tradition the probe will lay out a tea set and some cucumber sandwiches to attract alien lifeforms.

Re:The search

[AndrewHowe]

Let's hope the aliens are not cucumber-like.

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.

Most intense period of planetary exploration ever

[corleth]

Not only are Mars Express and Beagle 2 going to be joined by two NASA landers, but also the Japanese orbiter, Nozomi. These five missions will complement NASA's Mars Global Surveyor, launched in 1997, and Mars Odyssey, launched in 2001, which are still returning excellent data of the surface of Mars from orbit. This marks not only the beginning of the most intensive period of study of Mars in the history of space exploration, but also the start of a planetary science renaissance.

In addition to these missions, also keep an eye on the NASA/ESA Cassini-Huygens mission to Saturn and Titan, arriving later this year, as well as ESA's SMART-1 mission to the moon to be launched soon. Future plans include NASA's Mercury Messenger, and ESA's Venus Express and Bepi-Columbo.

Alternative to web broadcast

[corleth]

If you have access to Astra 2C satellite reception equipment, I suggest that you link directly in to the ESA television broadcast. The quality should be better and it might help relieve the slashdot effect. The details are as follows:

• Satellite:
• Astra 2C at 19 degrees East
  Reception frequency: 10832 MHz
  Polarisation: Horizontal
  Symbol rate: 22 Msymb/s
  FEC: 5/6
  Service ID: 61950
  Service name: ESA
  TXT: none
  Start of launch transmission: 19:15 CEST (17:15 GMT/UT)