Did anyone made reference to this project?
"The science team for Northern Light currently includes more than fifty scientists from twelve universities from across Canada. The mission is being developed by a public-private consortium of academic and industrial organizations led by Thoth Technology."

All this for only $20 million?!

It couldn't look more like Beagle 2 (physically, or programmatically) if it tried.

You need to put a 0 on the end of that $20M to make it work.

Doug

This web site hasn't been updated since 2004 that I can see, and it says nothing about how they were delivering anything to Mars. I'd assume, then, that this project is dead. I'd certainly not heard anything about it before.

The web site looks more like an old proposal (site dated 2004, press items on its web page dated 2002-04) than an active project. The 2009 launch date seems quite unrealistic now.

On the other hand, recent press material (Aug. 23, 2007) from York University, the lead academic institution for the project, implied the target date was still active with a helicopter drop test of the EDLS scheduled for September.

Steve

I see now that Mike has already made some of the same observations.

It seems to be alive and on schedule according to Ben Quine, the project leader...:

"It would go late in 2009. We're aiming to have all our hardware together a year from now, and that will give us a year to integrate and shake out the bugs."
"We seem to be on schedule. We've been working on this since 2001."

News released on Aug 22, 2007.

Some more press reports (incorporating material from the press release I mentioned earlier) from Ottawa and Vancouver. The Vancouver article indicates that Simon Fraser University is also contributing to the project. Note that these articles are all credited to Tom Spears, who also wrote the item cited by USTRAX.

There's also an old paper by Brendan Quine (the PI) alluding to an earlier planned 2007 launch date. Does anyone know anything about Quine's track record?

Whether there's much reality behind these optimistic reports remains to be seen.

Steve

I've got a bit of a hint as to where Quine is coming from. Looking him up in the Astrophysical Data System I found eight papers, one from 2001 on a proposed mars orbiter mission, the others on atmospheric spectral studies, related instrumentation, and baloon borne missions.

Steve

I see the University of Western Ontario is also a partner in Northern Light.
Shame on you Phil, did you plan to let us know after the landing ?

Based on the press release, it still looks like he's fishing for sponsors; wouldn't put too much stock in any schedule right now.

Doug's right, though; $20M seems ludicrously low for a feasible Mars mission.

Regarding the Beagle 2 inspiration, Colin Pillinger is on the science team as Co-I for the Lander...
I'll try to get something from that source...

While I think that might be unduly pessimistic (at least for the right team) I share your skepticism that a total mission cost of $20M (which presumably includes the Rockot launch, cruise stage, etc, as well as the landed hardware) is very (one is tempted to say "laughably") thin.

Of course if that's in Canadian dollars you need to knock another million off their low estimate. Comes to about 18.9 million US and 9.4 milllion GBPounds.

"I see the University of Western Ontario is also a partner in Northern Light.
Shame on you Phil, did you plan to let us know after the landing ? "



They never mentioned it to me! Seriously - I'm involved in PRIME, not this one.

Phil

Beagle 2's budget is rumoured to have been something like 3 to 5 times that much, and even at that price, significantly lower than it should have been.

Doug

Let's see :

Cost of transfering Zinedine Zidane from Juventus to Real Madrid: £45.6m
Cost of transfering Thierry Henri from Arsenal to Barcelona: £16.1m

Cost of sending an all-canadian probe to Mars to search for water and life: £9.4m

Hmm.....
It doesn't look good

Don't get your undergarments in a tangle, people.

The Canadian Space Agency has funded several concept studies. Universities and industry are putting together studies of several possible missions. I'm in one called PRIME, a Phobos mission. This is another. It's only a study. If the numbers are nonsense it won't happen. In our case, of course, the numbers are good. But it still won't happen!* But studies are valuable to get ideas out there, to train grad students etc., and often a bit of one study and a bit of another will actually get used in a third.

Look at all the Moon studies we've had recently - MoonLITE, Moonraker, Lunarex, MoonTWINS... how many of those will fly? But out of them comes an idea or a bit of equipment which eventually gets onto a flight project. It was the same even back in the Apollo days.

Phil


* well, it might...

Phil,

You've put your finger on the real value of Northern Light, but somehow this conceptual project has grown to the point that it's developers have released a launch date to the local press.

Steve

Because Mars's orbit is quite elliptical compared with Earth's, the mass you can send with a given launcher varies from opposition to opposition. So a mission plan will often refer to a specific launch period.

The real problem here is the inability (mostly on the part of the press) to distinguish between a study and a funded flight opportunity. Look at all the Mars Scout ideas floating around as well - very detailed studies tied to specific time frames, but most will never fly. There's nothing wrong with the study - just don't treat it like an actual mission plan. If it was to be developed, a more realistic budget would soon emerge.

Phil

Thoth on the other hand has this in its company news page :
"April 2005: First successful droptest of Mars-lander technology in Canada.
Northern Light successfully deployed with EDL parachute and non-bouncing airbag technology."

Phil:
Such studies are extremely valuable and will help breed the new generation of planetary scientists, we all agree on that.
Maybe the PI should reduce the PR (he is also president of Thoth) and focus on getting his numbers and dates sorted in more realistic terms.
[BTW, I lived in Canada for two years and I am fond of everything canadian.]

Don't down on the PR - just be realistic on a proposed budget. Great lessons to learn, but one of those lessons is realistic budgeting


Doug

Never lived there, but been there many times; nothin' but love for my most excellent neighbors! Nothing I'd like better then to see a Canadian Mars mission, too.

Quick story: There I was in Goose Bay, Newfoundland, February, freezing my unmentionables off while trying to fix a C-141 radar altimeter problem. All by myself, the aircrew was back at the hotel in crew rest. The airport people came out to check on me not once but several times with hot coffee and even once some soup...wow. That was just beyond nice of them.

And during this month we can wait for some news about it...:
"Next month (September), the York team will publicly test the entry, descent and landing system, dropping a prototype lander from a helicopter to simulate landing on Mars. The university says it has passed crash-tests held privately in the past.
The lander is to deploy a parachute and airbags, descend at 55 kilometres an hour, bounce safely to a stop on the university's soccer field, and open up solar panels."...I expect it to score a goal...without being offside...

EDITED: I've contacted Quine, he agreed to answer some questions, if all goes well I hope to have his presence tomorrow at spacEurope.

Phil, I believe that in this case the press limits itself to release what comes from the responsible ones...
I'll post a Q'n'A tomorrow at spacEurope with Northern Light PI, Brendan Quine, where he literally says the following:

"We are planning for a 2009 launch. We believe that
this is achievable given the work status thus far."

He said it, I have not altered a word...

He also speaks about several aspects including the Beaver rover, propulsion, data acquiring, what is being done by now and clarifies the $20K myth...

EDITED: It is already posted. What do you guys think of my headers? Beautiful I know...

Any news on this mission? It now says working toward a 2012 launch.

http://www.marsrocks.ca/

Well, a small amount of research shows that Mars is in Toronto, so the trip may not be as far as you think.

http://rd.mars.com/canada/

I'll consider a sample-return mission the next time I visit.

--Greg :-)

@Greg-

Re the 2012 launch date: I'd regard that as highly notional at best, and probably fictional at this point. Notice that they don't cite a booster model, launch site, etc.