Actually, Beagle 2 was not an ESA project, it was classified on an instrument on an ESA spacecraft - ESA's involvement was minimal and indeed that is one of the main recommendations from the B2 accident investigation documentation - that ESA's involvement should have been more extensive throughout development.


I don't know - it depends what Phoenix tells us. I can't imagine the polar regions justifying a rover ( fundamental reasons, the long polar nights of several months, and little change in terrain over rover scale - 5-50km - distances ) in the near future if ever - even the Phoenix PI admits "After all, this may be the last mission to the exciting polar region for a long time."

I would put a dozen of the MSL proposed landing sites higher up a list of "scientifically justifiable" for an MSL type vehicle before the polar regions - both from a position of scientific justification, and operational limitations...you only get six months before the dark comes - better to spend another 150kg on instruments to work the hell out of the reachable terrain, than 150kg putting wheels on the thing to do half a job on a dozen km of similar terrain

When you look at the HiRISE images of the Phoenix sites - you look at them....then look at one side, compare it to the other side...there would be no new science to be gained by traversing that. Looks at Gale crater - there would be new scince in moving 1 metre up the outcrop - same at a lot of Meridiani sites, and other sites. These are sites that REQUIRE mobility to do the best science - that is where the money should be spent on wheels.

I would rather send a static deep drill than a rover to either pole in actual fact - that would be the next interesting spacecraft in the MSL mass-scale vehicle ( 750kg on the ground ). Land anywhere within a 20km diameter circular landing site - take the remote drilling and analysis hardware that's been on the drawing board for a few years - and do the science with mobility in the vertical, not the horizontal...particularly given that where we see the layers from orbit - we're seing these layers both contaminated by current martian environmental conditions AND often on steep slopes that a rover could not navigate. Better to go 'high' and drill down through those layers ( and oh wow - the science from that would be amazing! - Martain climate records!)

In terms of a bigger picture - I don't think were at a point where we are able to send the mass of a payload that would justify mobility (a deep drill type instrument ) AND the means to move it a scientifically significant ( hundreds of km ) distance within one landing. I'd still pick something like a static deep drill over an MSL type vehicle as the next polar mission - simply from a 'best science per $' perspective.

Doug