Alright, stop, collaborate, and listen — Images sent back by the ESA’s Mars Express show the remants of icebergs once floating in a Martian Sea near the equator, and suggest that large ice blocks may well still exist just underneath the dusty surface (increasing both the chances of life on the Red Planet and the prospects for a successful manned mission.) Word to your mother.
Tag: ESA
Titan A.E.
Score one for the ESA: The Huygens probe successfully lands on Titan and broadcasts images from the surface for five hours (a.k.a. much longer than expected.) (See, NASA? It’s much easier to pull these types of missions off when you don’t have to convert from standard to metric and back.) And now, for Europa… Update: 2020 Hindsight has done an exemplary job today of covering the details and implications of the landing.
Scaling Back a Dream.
In according with the Dubya Mars timetable, NASA gives up on the ISS. Hmmm. “Publicly, NASA’s international partners have expressed support…Privately, they have voiced the opinion that the United States is not living up to its commitments.“
Laying the Groundwork/Snoopy Come Home.
NASA sets its sights on an Apollo-based Crew Exploration Vehicle (CEV) to replace the earlier space plane idea, and the Mars rover begins scrounging for water. Meanwhile, the search continues for the missing Beagle.
Red Rover.
W00t. I was on holiday break when the Beagle disappeared on Christmas Day, so now I’m doubly pleased that the Mars Rover has successfully landed on the Red Planet. Not only is it great for space exploration in general, but NASA needed a success in the worst way.
Voyage of the Beagle.
A flurry of probes, headed by the ESA’s Beagle 2, prep for christmas on Mars. Let’s hope they fare better than the ’99 wave.
Destination Moon.
As Europe goes to the moon (alas, without Tintin), China prepares to choose the first Taikonaut.
Spiders and Bots.
Two stories from the Welcome to the Future dept: NASA and the European Space Agency send dueling rovers to Mars in search of life, while scientists perfect gecko tape technology to create real-life “Spiderman” gloves. There’s a few origin stories in here somewhere.
Mars or Bust.
Russia proposes to NASA and the European Space Agency that we send humans to Mars by 2015. Great idea…and let’s get the Chinese involved as well.