The European Space Agency's first spacecraft to Mars, Mars Express launched in June 2003. The mission objectives are to search for subsurface water from orbit with a set of seven remote sensing instruments. The lander, Beagle 2, was released from the orbiter six days before Mars Express went into orbit around Mars, however, no signal was received from it despite repeated attempts at communication from a variety of spacecraft and Earth-based telescopes. Beagle 2 was declared lost on February 2004. The orbiter is operational and is expected to continue through 2014. Mars Express website.