Report cites lack of funding, poor management of project and lack of time to carry out tasks as keys to failure
The lead scientist on the failed UK Beagle 2 Mars lander project, Professor Colin Pillinger, lashed out at the enquiry report last week, calling its recommendations "red herrings" and pledging to push for another Beagle mission.
The report's findings on the loss of the lander broadly criticise the management of the project and cite a lack of time to complete key tasks. The full report, commissioned by UK science minister Lord Sainsbury and the European Space Agency (ESA), will not be made public - due to commercial sensitivities - but the published recommendations suggest a collision between the lander and its heat shield during ejection could have damaged the probe.
Pillinger, also head of planetary science at the Open University in Milton Keynes, says that is a "red herring" and the "only [cause] we have data for is that the atmosphere for Mars was too thin" which may have led to parachute failure.
A Martian dust storm days before Beagle 2 arrived may have caused the atmosphere to absorb more solar radiation and expand. The effect of an expanded, thinner atmosphere would be to undermine the deceleration parachutes, causing the probe to hit the ground at high speed. Pillinger adds that he has asked Lord Sainsbury to fund another Beagle mission with an improved lander.
The enquiry recommends that in future all necessary funding be committed at the outset; ESA make a full assessment; national agencies and ESA work together better; independent review recommendations are implemented; fixed-price contracting is avoided and probe design, especially communication equipment, is more robust.
"If there is a criticism that we didn't have good management then they should give us a [UK] space agency," says Pillinger.
The UK House of Commons' science and technology committee announced on 26 May that it would hold its own enquiry into Beagle 2. The committee will follow up on the published enquiry recommendations relating to funding and mission management.
It will not focus on technical issues but on the role of organisations such as the Department of Trade and Industry, ESA and the British National Space Centre. Committee chairman Ian Gibson says: "The research community wants to know what actually happened and be reassured that Beagle 3 won't go the same way."
ROB COPPINGER / LONDON
Source: Flight International
