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NZ mourns Christchurch quake dead

Rev Philip Robinson, top right, holds a service outside St Barnabas Church in Christchurch, New Zealand, 27 February 2011

Earthquake victims were remembered at churches in Christchurch and across New Zealand on Sunday

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Victims of this week’s magnitude 6.3 earthquake that devastated the centre of Christchurch have been honoured at church services across New Zealand.

Tuesday’s quake killed at least 145 people; some 200 are still missing.

Prime Minister John Key said there was still a glimmer of hope survivors could be found in the wreckage of the country’s worst-ever disaster.

But no-one has been found alive since Wednesday, and rescuers working for a fifth day are only finding bodies.

In the meantime, engineers say at least a third of the buildings in the centre of Christchurch will need to be demolished, while hundreds of damaged suburban homes may also have to be pulled down.

Mr Key said the disaster “may be New Zealand’s single most tragic event”, outstripping a 1931 quake in Napier which killed 256.

He said a two-minute silence would be held on Tuesday at 1251 local time (2351 GMT Monday), a week after the quake struck.

Having met relatives of the dead and missing, Mr Key said: “It’s fair to say they fear the worst but there is still a glimmer of hope.”

Families of the missing have appealed for the process of identifying dead bodies to be accelerated, but officials have asked for patience.

Updating the lists of the dead and missing was a slow and methodical process, said police spokesman Dave Cliff.

“We are going through it as fast as we possibly can in order to get the deceased reunited with their loved ones,” he said.

Rescuers from 10 countries, including Britain, Japan and the United States, have been searching broken buildings and piles of debris, as aftershocks continue.

An earth mover is parked in a street to demolish a collapsed building in Lyttelton on 26 February 2011 in Christchurch, New Zealand.

Rescuers say they are losing hope of finding the scores of people still missing

Emergency worker Phil Parker said teams of eight to 12 people were still going into buildings, but said the work was tough and unpredictable.

“We won’t be going into buildings that are deemed unsafe, that’s why we’re checking them now, but there’s always that danger of the buildings coming down on us,” he told the BBC.

Many damaged buildings will have to be pulled down, said Auckland University structural engineer Jason Ingham.

“We’ve collected some data over the past couple of days and it’s looking like about one-third of the buildings (would be condemned),” he told TVNZ.

For many residents, it is all too much, and there is an exodus from Christchurch, says the BBC’s Phil Mercer in the city.

Officials believe up to 22 bodies may lie beneath the rubble of Christchurch Cathedral; as many as 120 are thought to have been killed inside the collapsed CTV office block, including Japanese, Chinese and Philippine nationals; many others are presumed dead inside the destroyed Pyne Gould Guinness building.

Power has been restored to most of the city but water supply remains a problem, with residents being urged to boil water for drinking or cooking due to contamination fears.

The quake struck at a shallow depth of 5km (3.1 miles) early on Tuesday lunchtime, when the South Island city was at its busiest.

CLICKABLE Select the images for more details.

Bexley

Streets in the north-eastern suburb of Bexley were flooded as the quake caused water mains to burst, which coincided with heavy rain.

Pyne Gould Guinness

The multi-storey Pyne Gould Guinness Building, which normally houses around 200 workers, collapsed. A number of people were thought to be trapped inside.

Cathedral

The 63m spire of the city’s Anglican cathedral was toppled by the earthquake. A New Zealand TV reporter took a look inside the damaged building.

CTV building CTV building, Christchurch, New Zealand

Part of Christchurch’s Canterbury Television [CTV] building completely collapsed in the earthquake. Some 24 people have been rescued from the building, but police said there might be between 60 and 120 bodies trapped underneath.

Oxford Terrace

In the aftermath of the earthquake, Rhys Taylor took this video on Oxford Terrace, 50 metres away from the city’s main hospital. He said: “Cars were being used as ambulances to transport the injured.”

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This article is from the BBC News website. © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.

The bride’s a picture

Shout about it: Quirky prop usage is one way modern couples are displaying their individuality

Weddings – royal or not – are a big deal for those involved. Most couples expend much of their energy and resources on documenting the day so they can remember every detail, but has the way we preserve those memories changed?

As the royal wedding approaches, Kate Middleton and Prince William, and their team, will be frantically preparing. The sheer scale of the task is something most ordinary couples couldn’t contemplate, but one thing the young royals won’t have to worry about is whether the photos will turn out OK.

With the world’s press watching their every move on 29 April, this is one event that will be documented ad infinitum.

Tradition will surely dictate that the wedding photos for the heir to the throne and his future queen involve some pretty hefty formal family line-ups. Whether the couple add a modern twist to the proceedings is yet to be seen – video clips on YouTube or a page on Flickr perhaps?

One potential modern take on the wedding video was ruled out recently, when St James’s Palace announced that the event would not be filmed in 3D, despite requests from broadcasters.

“You have to have a proper first dance, you can’t get away with just shuffling about in circles. Everybody wants to have their five minutes of fame and get it online”

Debbie Diggle Wedding planner

It’s certainly the case that the way most brides and grooms choose to preserve their brief moment in the limelight has been evolving, away from the stuffy and predictable. We’ve pretty much moved on from the obligatory procession of relatives standing shoulder-to-shoulder in photos, and interminable, shaky 80s-style videos.

Creativity has been creeping in, with couples leaning more towards candid reportage and documentary-style stills and video. Meanwhile new technology has influenced the wedding experience as it has all other elements of life.

“We have heard from a wedding party who tweeted from the aisle to say ‘we’ve done it, we’re married’,” says Miranda Eason, editor of You and Your Wedding and Cosmopolitan Bride magazines.

At wedding video company High Definition Bride, based in West Sussex and London, even the most basic of packages offer compressed iPhone, mobile and web versions of wedding videos for their clients.

“It just offers something new if they can get it on their phone and show it to their friends,” says owner Anthony Aurelius.

Groom tearing bride's dress in "trash the dress" photoshoot. Pic: wedding-fotografen.at

The memories don’t always stop on the wedding day… post-event shoots known to some as “trash the dress” have become fashionable

Although most couples stick to a lower budget, up to 20 each year pay nearly £4,000 for the firm’s top-rate package – a four-camera shoot with a TV director that includes “diary room”-style messages from their loved ones, he says. One hundred edited DVDs are then sent out directly to the wedding guests a week later.

Anthony says that as technology has become cheaper – such as the high-definition cameras and editing equipment they use – it has opened up more possibilities for brides and grooms.

However, it has also opened the market to more and more operators who “think they can film and edit”, he adds – a view which is echoed by professional photographers who have seen a rise in amateur competitors since the advent of digital technology.

Although he has a clear interest in a flourishing wedding video sector, he does say he believes its “naff image”, which was perhaps prevalent for a while, has turned around.

“Consciousness is shifting because of [video-sharing website] YouTube and the availability of cameras – the public are thinking more and more about what they could do with it.”

The briefest of searches for wedding footage on YouTube turns up a seemingly never-ending list of clips. Surprise entrances, first dances and serenades are becoming more popular, and those moments are being shared with millions of strangers.

“YouTube has made a huge different to the first dance,” says Debbie Diggle, a wedding planner and tutor for the Institute of Professional Wedding Planners.

“You have to have a proper first dance, you can’t get away with just shuffling about in circles. Everybody wants to have their five minutes of fame and get it online,” she says.

But would couples really ever attempt to choreograph their wedding memories to gain notoriety on the web?

One couple that became part of the YouTube wedding dance phenomenon are south London-based Julia Boggio, from New Jersey, and her British husband James Derbyshire.

There will be no shortage of cameras at the royal couple’s wedding

Their infamous re-enactment of the final dance in the film Dirty Dancing became a massive YouTube hit in 2007.

With nearly 8.5m hits to date, the clip led to numerous media interviews and an appearance on US chat show Oprah Winfrey, during which Julia twirled with the original dirty dancer Patrick Swayze.

Julia is an award-winning wedding and portraits photographer, but insists the video was not a publicity stunt – it was posted online 18 months after their marriage when they became aware of YouTube as a way to share the moment with friends in the US, she says.

Conscious that weddings can seem formulaic to guests who often attend several each year, Julia and James did the dance to create a “stand-out” moment that suited their creative personalities, she says.

But she adds that she did meet one client who said she had a “bone to pick” with her – a friend had aspired to copy the Julia-James phenomenon with a big wedding dance number, involving lots of her guests, and hoped it would prove an internet success.

“The bride really wanted the dance to go on YouTube and to get loads of hits. But she was being really ‘bridezilla’ about it – her intention was to get famous, and that’s not really how these things happen.”

Julia’s work has a “niche” blend of quirky, fashion-shoot style photography that she says helped pioneer the use of props in wedding stills.

“They want people to come away from the wedding and say ‘that was so them’”

Miranda Eason You & Your Wedding

“People are treating their weddings more like a show and they’re having fun with it.

“I see the personalities of the couples coming out so much more strongly. They are drawing influences from all sorts of places now, like wedding blogs,” she says.

With her husband’s input they also do videos, with the aim of producing a “documentary about two families coming together” – a process so intensive they take on no more than five per year, at £6,000 each.

But it’s not just the wedding event itself – recording the “story” has expanded beyond the day with numerous photographic and video businesses offering pre and post-wedding shoots to add to the portfolio.

This includes the relatively recent phenomena of a US and Australian craze they call “trash the dress” – also known as “treasure the dress”, “rock the frock” or, in Julia’s case, the “I do redo”.

A post-wedding shoot, it usually takes place at a venue that contrasts with the couple’s wedding, and in some cases does involve literally “trashing” the outfits, such as by jumping into the sea or rolling in mud.

“The point is to do things they weren’t able to do on the wedding day. It extends the wedding experience and varies it. Sometimes people get a bit depressed after the wedding and want to do something as a couple, or they simply want another chance to wear an expensive dress they have only had on once,” says Julia.

Whatever people choose to do, says wedding magazines editor Ms Eason, it is more likely nowadays that they will use the different ways available to them to “put their own stamp” on the event.

“What they want is to find their way to capture the unfolding story of the day. They want people to come away from the wedding and say ‘that was so them’.”

This article is from the BBC News website. © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.

VIDEO: Bonham Carter ‘treated like royalty’

Helena Bonham Carter is up for an Oscar for her role as the Queen Mother in The King’s Speech but said she doesn’t mind if she doesn’t win.

This article is from the BBC News website. © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.

King’s Speech seeks Oscars crown

Will The King’s Speech or The Social Network reign supreme?

The final countdown to the Oscars has begun, with The King’s Speech and The Social Network going head to head for the coveted best picture prize.

The former, which has taken more than $230m (£142m) at the global box office, has 12 nominations, including a best actor nod for Colin Firth.

James Franco and Anne Hathaway will host the 83rd Academy Awards, which take place in Los Angeles later.

Voting by the Academy’s 5,755 members ended earlier this week.

Outside the Kodak theatre on Hollywood Boulevard, the traditional red carpet is ready for the influx of A-list talent.

The show’s organisers are aiming at a more youthful edge this year, with 28-year-old Hathaway set to become the youngest host in Oscar history.

Franco and Hathaway on preparing to host the Oscars

Viewers should not expect them to deliver in-jokes aimed at the celebrity audience, as Ricky Gervais did at this year’s Golden Globes.

Movie montages have also been scrapped, though the Oscar-nominated songs – omitted from last year’s ceremony – will be making a comeback.

The evening will see Randy Newman, Mandy Moore and Gwyneth Paltrow performing songs from Toy Story 3, Tangled and Country Strong respectively.

Britain’s Florence Welch, meanwhile, will sing If I Rise from 127 Hours, which Dido performed in Danny Boyle’s film.

127 Hours is one of 10 films up for best picture, an award The King’s Speech has been tipped to win by The Hollywood Reporter.

According to the industry paper, Academy voters – who have an average age of 57 – are more likely to identify with its middle-aged heroes than The Social Network’s youthful, fast-talking cast.

The latter film has eight nominations in all, as does Christopher Nolan’s sci-fi epic Inception. The Coen brothers’ western True Grit has 10 nods.

Other films up for best picture include Black Swan, The Fighter, The Kids are All Right and Winter’s Bone.

The King’s Speech is riding high on a wave of success, having won seven awards at the Baftas and a slew of other prizes.

Oscars in numbers5,755 – number of Oscar voters50 – number of Oscar statuettes created for this year’s winners248 – number of films eligible for best picture this year700 – number of bleacher seats for fans on red carpet10 – number of shows held at the Kodak theatre3,300 – number of seats inside500 – length (in feet) of red carpet

In the best actor category Firth is up against Jeff Bridges for True Grit, Javier Bardem for Biutiful and Franco for 127 Hours.

Jesse Eisenberg is also nominated for his portrayal of Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg in The Social Network

Golden Globe and Bafta winner Natalie Portman is the hot tip to receive the best actress prize for Black Swan.

Yet she faces competition from Annette Bening, for The Kids Are All Right, and Nicole Kidman, for Rabbit Hole.

Jennifer Lawrence is also nominated for Winter’s Bone, while Michelle Williams is up for romantic drama Blue Valentine.

Yet it is the battle for the supporting actress Oscar that looks set to be one of the closest races.

The Fighter’s Melissa Leo is considered to be favourite, though some have wondered if her decision to self-finance an advertising campaign promoting herself to voters might damage her chances.

She will also face a strong challenge from her Fighter co-star Amy Adams and from Helena Bonham Carter, who plays the future Queen Mother in The King’s Speech.

Nor should one should rule out a surprise win for 14-year-old newcomer Hailee Steinfeld for her assured performance in True Grit.

Weaver is recogised for Australian crime drama Animal Kingdom

There is a lot of admiration too for Jacki Weaver, whose role in crime drama Animal Kingdom has made her the first Australian actress to be Oscar-nominated for an Australian film.

One name that has dominated headlines in the Oscars build-up has been Banksy, whose film Exit Through the Gift Shop is up for best documentary.

While other nominees have been on the chat show circuit, the elusive British artist made his presence felt by placing examples of his graffiti art around Los Angeles.

It has led to speculation about what might happen if Banksy wins. Will he accept the award in disguise? Will he even turn up at all?

All will be revealed once the Academy Awards get under way on Monday at 0100 GMT.

This article is from the BBC News website. © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.

Razzies honour worst films – a night before Oscars

Dev Patel as Prince Zuko in a scene from The Last Airbender

The Last Airbender won worst film, worst supporting actor, worst director, worst screenplay and worst 3D

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M Night Shyamalan’s The Last Airbender has blown away all competition at the Razzies – Hollywood’s Oscar spoof mocking the year’s worst performances.

The film won five Golden Raspberry Awards – including worst director for Shyamalan – in a light-hearted ceremony on the eve of Sunday’s Oscars.

Ashton Kutcher snatched worst actor for Valentine’s Day; his co-star Jessica Alba won worst supporting actress.

The evening’s so-called winners were chosen by 657 voters in 18 countries.

Sex and the City 2 took away three awards, including “worst prequel, remake, rip-off or sequel”, worst actress – won collectively by co-stars Sarah Jessica Parker, Kim Cattrall, Kristin Davis and Cynthia Nixon – and worst ensemble for its entire cast.

But it was a fantasy action film about people who can control fire, air, water and earth that stole the show, despite making $320m (£200m) at global box offices last summer.

The Last Airbender – in which a boy uses his extraordinary powers bring harmony to a waring world – won worst film, worst director and worst screenplay for Shyamalan and worst supporting actor (for Jackson Rathbone).

It also won a special award for “worst eye-gouging misuse of 3D”.

Shyamalan – who won an Oscar nomination in 1999 for The Sixth Sense – adapted the film from the animated television series Avatar: The Last Airbender.

“He managed to take a cartoon property and make it even less lifelike by making it with real actors,” said Razzies founder John Wilson.

“Most people who like the show, and this would include my 14-year-old son, hated the movie. It made no sense whatsoever.”

This article is from the BBC News website. © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.

Then and now

A girl walks on 9 February 2011 amid basic houses in the coastal city of Dichato, 450 km south of Santiago, devastated by the quake and tsunami of 27 February 2010.

Building new homes for the quake survivors has been the biggest challenge

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A year after her house in the town of Licanten came crashing down around her in the middle of the night, Erica Poblete’s memories of the massive earthquake that struck Chile on 27 February are still vivid.

“I remember the cries and the shouts of people trapped in the rubble,” she says, sitting in the wooden shelter that has been her home for nearly 12 months.

“The days that followed were terrible. We spent six weeks virtually living on the streets. We had one small tent between three of us. We slept in shelters made out of bed sheets. We used old paint pots as toilets. Until we finally came here.”

“Here” is Villa Solidaridad, a makeshift camp housing 26 families who lost their houses in the quake.

Then and now

Men walk through debris on the beach at Pelluhue in the wake of the quake on 27 February 2010 (left); a child sits on the same beach on 25 January 2011 (right)

In pictures: Chile quake one year on

The shelters have electricity and water but the showers are cold. The walls and roofs are made of cheap, rough wood and are prone to leaks.

There is no oven. Mrs Poblete and her 15-year-old son cook on a camping stove.

Outside, dogs and children play in the dusty streets. Washing is hung out to dry on barbed wire.

People have used pot plants and paint to make the shelters feel like home but they are no substitute for the houses they lost.

“They’re planning to build new houses for us but we have no idea when we’ll be able to move into them,” Mrs Poblete says.

It is a story heard across central-southern Chile. A year on from the 8.8 magnitude quake, there is still a lot of work to be done.

“More than half of what the earthquake and the tsunamis destroyed has now been rebuilt,” President Sebastian Pinera said on Tuesday as he launched a new National Emergency Agency, designed to help deal with future natural disasters.

“But while recognising that we’ve rebuilt half … we also have to recognise that the other half of the job remains to be done,” he added.

Counting the cost

Destroyed or damaged:

220,000 houses3,700 schools40 hospitals1,500km roads200 bridgesDetailed map of the quake

Days earlier, Mr Pinera visited the fishing village of Dichato, virtually wiped off the map by the tsunamis that swept inland within minutes of the quake.

He was met by a small group of angry locals, dismayed by the pace of reconstruction.

“I know that it’s taken longer than people would have liked, and longer than we would have liked,” President Pinera told them.

“It’s not due to a lack of will on our part, but we know that we’re behind in areas like housing and health.”

In its defence, the government points out the enormity of the task it faced when it assumed office on 11 March, just two weeks after the earthquake.

At around 550, the death toll was relatively low – certainly compared to the estimated 220,000 killed by the Haitian quake six weeks earlier.

But the economic damage was enormous.

According to the United Nations, the Chilean quake was the most costly natural disaster in the world in 2010, accounting for $30bn(£18.5bn) of the global damage put at $109bn.

Erica Poblete says the psychological effect on people has been huge

In a relatively small country like Chile, the impact was brutal – $30bn is 18% of GDP.

A report published in January showed the percentage of Chileans living in poverty – a figure that has been declining for decades – rose to 19.4% in mid-2010 from 16.4% in 2009. It is widely accepted that the earthquake was to blame.

According to the government, almost all of that damage to infrastructure has now been repaired, although opposition politicians dispute that claim. Housing the survivors remains the biggest challenge.

“The housing ministry says it’s approved 130,000 subsidies for the construction of new homes but that’s not the same as saying that 130,000 houses are actually being built,” says Felipe Cubillos, the head of a private sector foundation involved in the reconstruction effort.

“No one knows how many houses are under construction and I suspect it’s not many.”

Mrs Poblete says the psychological impact of the disaster has been huge, especially for children.

View of a damaged street in Talcahuano town, some 532 km (329 miles) south of Santiago (left); same location on 22 February 2011 (right)

Infrastructure is being mended but many people’s lives are still deeply affected

People want to forget the quake and move on with their lives, but the ground beneath their feet is still shaking.

In the year since the tragedy, there have been thousands of aftershocks including at least 10 of magnitude 6.4 or above – 10 quakes bigger than the one that hit New Zealand this past week.

Psychologists say post-traumatic stress is widespread.

Shortly after the quake, it was widely speculated that it had released pressure on the fault line running through the affected area.

But a study released in January suggested the strain has not been released markedly, and has in fact increased in places – a finding sure to keep Chileans on edge.

Thousands of survivors of the earthquake have already spent one Chilean winter living in tents and wooden huts.

As the summer draws to a close in the southern hemisphere, and the first winds of autumn sweep up from the Antarctic, many here are preparing to do the same again.

This article is from the BBC News website. © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.

Irish opposition claims poll win

caroline connors from galway casts her vote

Caroline Connors casts her vote in Galway before her wedding service

The polls have closed in the Republic of Ireland’s general election.

Turnout is believed to be close to 70%. There are 566 candidates contesting 165 seats in the Irish parliament.

The ballot was called a few months after the ruling coalition negotiated an 85bn-euro (£72bn) EU/IMF loan package. Divisions had emerged in the ruling coalition between Fianna Fail and the Green Party.

The first results are expected early on Saturday afternoon.

The turnout in this election is believed to have been significantly higher than the 62% that voted in the 2007 general election.

Large numbers of voters in urban and rural areas turned out since polling stations opened at 0700 GMT on Friday.

Voting in one polling station in Salthill in Galway city was disrupted briefly when part of the floor in the assembly hall of St Enda’s National school began to buckle.

The polling booths were moved into individual classrooms, and voting continued.

It is the first general election since the country was bailed out by the European Union and the IMF in November.

There are 566 candidates fighting in 43 constituencies for 165 seats in the Irish parliament, Dail Eireann.

The speaker of the Irish parliament (Ceann Comhairle) is automatically returned.

While a record 233 independents, including those in smaller parties, are standing, only 85 female candidates (15% of those contesting the election) are seeking seats in the 31st Dail.

The Irish use the system of proportional representation to elect members of parliament rather than the first-past-the-post method.

Ballot boxes from the 6,000 or so polling stations will be stored securely overnight.

The counting of votes will get under way at 0900 GMT on Saturday in 35 count centres and trends should become clear in the early afternoon before declarations are formally made.

It will take two days to count the votes but all the indications are that Fianna Fail who have have been power for the past 14 years will be heavily defeated .

Every opinion poll in the run-up to the election suggested the new government would be led by the main opposition party, Fine Gael.

And the party is confident of victory.

Their leader, Enda Kenny, has said that if he becomes the next Irish prime minister, he will try to re-negotiate the terms of Ireland’s international bail-out.

He has also said he would welcome a first visit to the Republic of Ireland by the Queen.

This article is from the BBC News website. © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.

Artist's conception of Kepler-11 system (Nasa/T Pyle)

Telescopes such as Nasa’s Kepler observatory are finding huge numbers of exoplanets

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The European Space Agency (Esa) has selected four new mission concepts to compete for a launch opportunity at the start of the 2020s.

The mission ideas cover a broad range of disciplines, from investigations of black holes and general relativity to a near-Earth asteroid sample-return and studies of planets orbiting far-away stars.

The concepts have rather impenetrable names right now – Loft, STE-Quest, MarcoPolo-R, and Echo – but that will change for the one eventually selected.

“Originally we had 47 proposals,” said Fabio Favata, head of Esa’s Science Planning and Community Coordination Office.

“Our working groups and the Space Science Advisory Committee did a great job in trimming the list when they had quite a number of missions that could all potentially make good candidates,” he told BBC News.

The mission concepts are put together by research teams whose members drawn from across Europe:

Large Observatory For X-ray Timing (Loft): The mission would go after the fast-moving, high-energy environments that surround black holes, neutron stars and pulsars – objects that can produce sudden and very rapid bursts of X-rays. By observing this emission, scientists would hope to address questions related to fundamental physics: they could probe the effects of matter entering ultra-strong gravitational fields and ultra-dense states. They could also measure more accurately the mass and spin of black holes; and in the case of the biggest such objects in the Universe, this has something interesting to say about how they, and the galaxies that host them, formed.

Space-Time Explorer and Quantum Equivalence Principle Space Test (STE-Quest): Again, this mission would address some big physics topics. One objective would be to test “the equivalence principle”, which underpins several fundamental assumptions including the idea that gravity will accelerate all objects in a vacuum equally regardless of their masses or the materials from which they are made. The Apollo 15 astronaut Dave Scott famously demonstrated this principle when he dropped a hammer and feather on the Moon in 1971 and both hit the surface at the same time. STE-Quest would put very sensitive instrumentation on an orbiting to do a far more precise test of whether gravity really is so blind or perhaps varies on some scales.

MarcoPolo-R comes out of a previous submission to an Esa science mission competition

MarcoPolo-R: This is an idea that has been around for a while. The mission would attempt to return a sample of material from an asteroid for detailed analysis in Earth laboratories. The most primitive asteroids contain geochemistry not observable in Earth rocks because they are constantly recycled. As such, asteroids can tell scientists a lot about conditions in the early Solar System, and about the original “stuff” that went into making the planets billions of years ago. One potential target is actually two asteroids in close proximity – a binary known as (175706) 1996FG3. The larger rock is about 1.5km across; its companion is less than half a km in diameter.

Exoplanet Characterisation Observatory (Echo): This is a 1.2m telescope that would study planets circling far-away stars. In recent years, hundreds of these so-called exoplanets have been detected, but we no precious little about them yet. Echo would observe the planets as they moved in front of their stars. From the way the light is attenuated, the telescope’s detectors would be able to probe the atmospheres of these worlds. Echo would look for the presence of molecules such as ozone and carbon dioxide in the atmospheres. These and other markers might tell us something about whether any of the exoplanets have conditions capable of supporting life.

It takes a long time to plan and then implement a mission. The science has to be compelling and the engineering requirements must be realistic. The feasibility of implementing this quartet will now be thoroughly investigated before a “winner” is chosen. It could take up to four years for a final decision to be made.

Esa is running the competition under its Cosmic Vision programme, and has about 470 million euros (at 2010 prices) to spend on what it terms a Medium Class science mission. The member states would individually cover the cost of building any instruments that go on the spacecraft.

This new opportunity is known as M3; the reason being that there is already a competition in play for an M1 and an M2 spacecraft, with the first of these likely to launch in 2017.

Esa has a Large Class of much more expensive ventures, as well. This competition is in the final stages of selection with a launch opportunity proposed for 2020. If the winner of this competition is delayed for any reason and cannot make the 2020 slot, Esa would like the M3 proposal to be ready to take its place on the launch pad.

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This article is from the BBC News website. © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.