CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. -- The first of a trio of new Mars-bound spacecraft is on its way to the Red Planet.
The $353 million Mars Express mission was successfully launched Monday atop a commercial Starsem Soyuz rocket from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan.
Liftoff of the European Space Agency (ESA) probe, which includes an orbiter and a lander, came right on time at 1:45 p.m. EDT (1745 GMT).
"Mars Express has made a very, very good start to its long journey to the Red Planet. I feel great about it," said David Southwood, ESA's director of science.
The three-stage rocket and the additional Fregat upper stage carried Mars Express into Earth orbit without incident, according to launch commentators.
With Mars Express still attached to the upper stage, the Fregat booster fired its engine twice: the first time to place the probe in a stable low Earth orbit and the second time to speed the probe on its way to Mars, fast enough to escape Earth's gravity.
Spacecraft separation then took place about 92 minutes after blastoff.
It was the 11th Soyuz launch marketed by Starsem, a joint European and Russian venture that also has plans to send Soyuz rockets into orbit from the Guiana Space Center in South America -- home of Arianespace.
"With Mars Express, Europe is building its own expertise in many fields. This ranges from the development of science experiments and new technologies - new for European industries - to the control of a mission that includes landing on another planet. We have never done this before," said Rudi Schmidt, Mars Express Project Manager.
The next step is for the spacecraft's electricity-generating solar arrays to open and for the probe to make contact with ESA's ground station in New Norcia, Western Australia.
Three days from now another important milestone is planned, namely the release of the launch clamps that held the Beagle 2 lander in place next to the main spacecraft. ESA officials say this is necessary in order to be able to eject Beagle 2 when the probe arrives at Mars on Dec. 24.
"We have tested all aspects of the Mars Express mission well enough to be confident that there will be no errors or trivial mistakes. Mars Express has been developed in a record-breaking time, but there have been no compromises in testing, including the ground segment," Schmidt said.
The Mars Express orbiter is hauling along a suite of scientific instruments that is to conduct global high-resolution imaging, carry out planet-wide mineralogical mapping and chart global atmospheric circulation -- among other duties.
While ESA's Mars Express swings about Mars, the Beagle 2 -- built by Astrium for the United Kingdom -- is set to become the first lander since NASA's two Viking probes in the 1970s to expressly look for indications of past or present life.
No other Mars probe planned so far is centrally focused on making measurements with exobiology in mind, Beagle 2 scientists say.
Beagle 2 is to touch down Dec. 24 at Isidis Planitia, a flat basin on Mars with ground water ice possibly lurking a few feet below surface.
Meanwhile, at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station a pair of identical Mars-bound robots are being readied for launches atop Boeing Delta 2 rockets.
Mars Exploration Rover-A (MER-A) is targeted to fly no earlier than June 8, while MER-B is set to launch June 25. NASA mission managers are reviewing their launch plans and plan to announce on Tuesday whether or not they will be ready to go with the first of the rover missions on June 8.
These twin probes are to land Jan. 24 and 25 on opposite sides of Mars near the equator and perform 90-day missions. Unlike Mars Express, which is more a biology mission, MER-A and MER-B are focused on geology and deciphering clues to past existence of water.
The space agency plans to announce Saturday more poetic and inspirational names for the twin Martian missions.
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