The mystery about what happened to Beagle 2 Mars Lander has been finally solved. The Beagle 2 never radioed to Earth after descending to the Red Planet surface. However images now confirm that Beagle 2 did land after all and an 11 year old mystery has been finally solved.
The Beagle 2 Mars Lander was jam-packed with instruments to look for signs of life on Mars. After a glorious lift-off the European Space Agency’s Mars Express orbiter, it dropped into the Martian atmosphere on December 25, 2003.The Beagle then went silent.
The images reveal that the lander’s solar panel did not fully open after the landing. The paucity of power prevented the craft to extend its antenna and to communicate with controllers on Earth.
The reasons of the failure of the Lander may not be fully known; the discovery of the Lander will surely put an end to speculations about what exactly happened to the Beagle 2 Mars Lander, said Mark Sims, a Beagle 2 team member from the University of Leicester.
