Beagle: You get what you pay for...

Seems every mention of the Beagle's likely demise has a comparison of
its small budget to the much more expensive and so-far successful MER
mission.

It was a good try by the Euros, and should be realized that it was an
adjunct to the primary mission of the Mars Express, not the other way
around.

The problem is, a rookie landing attempt with corners being cut (ie.,
especially in testing and lack of system redundancy) is clearly bound
for failure in a historically hostile environment that Mars is.

This is the surprise in seeing the relative naivete' of those who
planned Beagle. For it to succeed would have been incredibly lucky;
clearly something that would have to beat very long odds.

I hope the Euros will attempt another lander in the future, but that a
realistic budget be allocated the next time around, or not try at all.

TaB h wrote:

I hope the Euros will attempt another lander in the future, but that a
realistic budget be allocated the next time around, or not try at all.


So lets talk about the failed high budget Mars landers in the meanwhile?

--
Sander

+++ Out of cheese error +++

"TaB h" wrote in message
...

Seems every mention of the Beagle's likely demise has a comparison of
its small budget to the much more expensive and so-far successful MER
mission.

It was a good try by the Euros, and should be realized that it was an
adjunct to the primary mission of the Mars Express, not the other way
around.

The problem is, a rookie landing attempt with corners being cut (ie.,
especially in testing and lack of system redundancy) is clearly bound
for failure in a historically hostile environment that Mars is.

This is the surprise in seeing the relative naivete' of those who
planned Beagle. For it to succeed would have been incredibly lucky;
clearly something that would have to beat very long odds.

I hope the Euros will attempt another lander in the future, but that a
realistic budget be allocated the next time around, or not try at all.


A successfull Beagle mission would have been very embarassing for NASA. Can
you imagine a home run on the first try. I would have been exceedingly
embarrasing if Beagle had found traces of (ancient) Martian life. That would
have led to some very rigorous questioning by U.S. lawmakers, no doubt. NASA
got off lucky this time. Next time, the Europeans may well get something
down on Mars intact.

On Wed, 7 Jan 2004 22:02:53 +0100, "Dr. O" dr.o@xxxxx wrote:

A successfull Beagle mission would have been very embarassing for NASA. Can
you imagine a home run on the first try. I would have been exceedingly
embarrasing if Beagle had found traces of (ancient) Martian life. That would
have led to some very rigorous questioning by U.S. lawmakers, no doubt.

Would'a, should'a, could'a...

NASA
got off lucky this time. Next time, the Europeans may well get something
down on Mars intact.

Not if they keep trying to do it on the cheap. NASA learned that
lesson. Will the Brits?

Brian

TaB h wrote in message . ..
Seems every mention of the Beagle's likely demise has a comparison of
its small budget to the much more expensive and so-far successful MER
mission.

It was a good try by the Euros, and should be realized that it was an
adjunct to the primary mission of the Mars Express, not the other way
around.

Of course, this realization would require a basic rewiring of the
human spirit--as should be obvious from comparing the web hits after
the last two successful martian orbiters vs. the current lander.

If ESA would just take a casual glace at what the salary paying public
really wants out of a space program, it should be obvious that Mars
Express will be judged by the public on the basis of its failed
lander, not its successful orbiter. We care if we can see ourselves
there. Mars Express: great for science, ho-hum for the public. Beagle,
if successful, would have been huge for ESA and the UK. Instead, it's
a ho-hum failure.

And thousands of European children are currently logged online to
check out the latest from. . . NASA. Gee, where do you think the next
budding Michael Foale will chose to live?



Tom Merkle

Brian Thorn wrote in message . ..
On Wed, 7 Jan 2004 22:02:53 +0100, "Dr. O" dr.o@xxxxx wrote:
NASA
got off lucky this time. Next time, the Europeans may well get something
down on Mars intact.

Not if they keep trying to do it on the cheap. NASA learned that
lesson. Will the Brits?

Right, like with Stardust, that complete failure of a
mission that's put the final nail in the coffin of the
Discovery program (among so many other failures in that
ill-advised program).

I say, we should take all the money in NASA's annual
budget and save it up for 20 years and then launch a
combo manned / robotic flyby and rendezvous mission to
every body in the solar system with a diameter larger
than 1,000 km. If more money is always better then ALL
the money in one gigantic mission has to be the best
possible plan.

In article ,
(Tom Merkle) wrote:

TaB h wrote in message
. ..
Seems every mention of the Beagle's likely demise has a comparison of
its small budget to the much more expensive and so-far successful MER
mission.

It was a good try by the Euros, and should be realized that it was an
adjunct to the primary mission of the Mars Express, not the other way
around.

Of course, this realization would require a basic rewiring of the
human spirit--as should be obvious from comparing the web hits after
the last two successful martian orbiters vs. the current lander.

If ESA would just take a casual glace at what the salary paying public
really wants out of a space program, it should be obvious that Mars
Express will be judged by the public on the basis of its failed
lander, not its successful orbiter. We care if we can see ourselves
there. Mars Express: great for science, ho-hum for the public. Beagle,
if successful, would have been huge for ESA and the UK. Instead, it's
a ho-hum failure.

I also notice they've cut the lander from their BepiColombo Mercury
mission. Ah well. C'est la vie.

--
Stephen Souter

http://www.edfac.usyd.edu.au/staff/souters/

On 7 Jan 2004 19:24:31 -0800, (Christopher M.
Jones) wrote:


Not if they keep trying to do it on the cheap. NASA learned that
lesson. Will the Brits?

Right, like with Stardust, that complete failure of a
mission that's put the final nail in the coffin of the
Discovery program (among so many other failures in that
ill-advised program).

Cheap is relative. Mars Polar Lander was done on a shoestring budget,
for NASA. Beagle 2, as has been said, was done on a dental-floss
budget, even by European standards.

Note to the Brits: if you want to go to Mars, you'll need to spend
more money than that. Some things, like space exploration, simply
won't tolerate zero redundancy.

Note that I, among many others here, warned that success for Beagle 2
was unlikely, precisely because of its complete lack of backup
systems.

Brian

In article ,
Brian Thorn wrote:
Note to the Brits: if you want to go to Mars, you'll need to spend
more money than that. Some things, like space exploration, simply
won't tolerate zero redundancy.

The simplest and best way to add redundancy, though, is to launch more
than one spacecraft.

Note that I, among many others here, warned that success for Beagle 2
was unlikely, precisely because of its complete lack of backup
systems.

The success rate for non-redundant spacecraft has actually been fairly
good of late. Notably, there was little redundancy on Mars Pathfinder.
(And yes, lots of people within JPL were saying it was bound to fail...
which probably helped it, by making the Old Guard bureaucrats keep their
distance.)

How can you provide a probe like Beagle 2 with, say, a redundant airbag
system? The answer is, you can't. Electronics is the only area where
it's really *easy* to provide redundancy, and modern electronic systems
are extremely reliable even without it. Their failures are mostly design
errors, which redundancy is little protection against. Most of the places
where redundancy is easy don't really need it much any more; most of the
places where it's really needed, either it's very difficult to provide or
the failure modes are such that it may not help much (having a redundant
propulsion system would not have saved Mars Observer, even though that's
where the failure was).
--
MOST launched 30 June; science observations running | Henry Spencer
since Oct; first surprises seen; papers pending. |

(Henry Spencer) wrote in
:


The simplest and best way to add redundancy, though, is to launch more
than one spacecraft.


Agreed -- provided there isn't a systemic design flaw. The redundant Mars
Observatory would very likely have gone up in a puff of smoke like its
brothers when the fuel system was activated.

--
Reed