Sometimes it's better to light a flamethrower than curse the darkness

I still remember Beagle 2, which was the subject of one of my first LJ entries to get lots of compliments and still one I'm fond of. So I remember poor doomed Beagle 2 fondly, too.

So I was amazed to read today that it's showed up on images taken of the Martian surface, painstakingly scrutinized for the little thing, which is just at the limits of the high-resolution photos. Apparently the entry, descent and landing sequence worked and it did indeed successfully land on Mars on Christmas Day 2003.

It'd never occurred to me that imaging on Mars could include looking for stuff we'd sent there, but apparently there'd been prvious searches for Beagle 2. It's not like they just stumbled across it; it sounds like it was tricky to find because it's so small.

People who'd worked on the project expressed happiness about these things, and while it must be nice to know what happened to Beagle 2, I can't help but think it'd add a little element of heartbreak to learn that the mission did so many things right, came so close to the success all those people had worked so hard for.