Lost Beagle found: UK’s missing spacecraft spotted after 11 years on Mars

World Today

In this image provided by NASA an annotated image shows a bright feature interpreted as the United Kingdom’s Beagle 2 Lander with solar arrays at least partially deployed on the surface of Mars. (AP Photo/NASA/JPL-Caltech/Univ. of Arizona/University of Leicester)

The European Space Agency says its Beagle-2 lander, which had been lost on Mars since 2003, has been found.

ESA said in a statement Friday that new photos taken by the high-resolution camera on NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter show the lander partially deployed on the surface of the Red Planet.

Beagle-2 had not been heard of since it separated from its mother ship, but ESA says the images prove the entry, descent, and landing sequence did work and that it successfully landed on Mars on Christmas Day in 2003.

Report complied with information from The Associated Press