British Beagle team facing failure

A British mission to Mars is facing failure after a third day of disappointment when its space probe again failed to send a signal…

A British mission to Mars is facing failure after a third day of disappointment when its space probe again failed to send a signal to confirm it had landed safely.

The failure to pick up a signal from Beagle 2 has raised fears that the probe, no bigger than an open umbrella, may have suffered the same fate as so many craft before it and ended up as scrap metal strewn across the bleak Martian landscape.

"Tonight's scan for a signal from Beagle 2 by the Lovell Telescope at Jodrell Bank Observatory was unsuccessful," mission organisers said on their website.

Of the previous 11 probes dropped on the red planet's surface, only three have survived and it is estimated that around two in every three Russian and US missions to Mars have been whole or partial failures.

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The €300 million Beagle 2 had been hailed as a triumph for British ingenuity and is the first fully European mission to be sent to any planet.

European Space Agency (ESA) officials said yesterday they were still optimistic of finding the probe. There are 13 further scheduled transmissions before it goes into emergency auto-transmit mode.

Beagle 2's failure to make contact soured Christmas and St Stephen's Day for scientists, who are trying to answer a question which has fascinated mankind for generations - "Is there life on Mars?"

They gathered in London on Thursday and Friday, hoping to hear the probe broadcasting its signature tune - composed for the occasion by pop group Blur - across the 100 million km from Mars.

ESA officials said that even if Beagle 2 was not found, the Mars Express mother craft that carried the 34 kg probe had successfully been guided on to an orbit around Mars from where it would study the planet for two years.

"For the scientists here the orbiter is the most important part of the mission," said Gerhard Schwehm, an ESA planetary mission official. "The landing probe on Mars is in essence the icing on the cake."