Space - the Rosetta project

[peterb]

Possibly one of the most challenging projects since the Martian landing.

Today, after a journey taking ten years, the Rosetta spacecraft will launch a probe to land on a comet.

This is a European Space Agency Mission - more details can be found here

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rosetta_mission

and

http://rosetta.esa.int

[cheesemp]

So excited by this - Watching the live feed as and when I can!

Worth keeping an eye on these twitter feeds too..
https://twitter.com/Philae2014
https://twitter.com/ESA_Rosetta

[Allen]

It has landed!

[peterb]

An incredible fachievement for science and engineering.

http://rosetta.esa.int

Big UK involvement to!

[neonplanet40]

Very happy to hear this! I only wish we did more on exploring space

[Hoonigan]

This is absolutely astonishing! A journey of 300,000,000 miles, to land on a comet only two and a half miles in diameter!

YEAH SCIENCE!!

[peterb]

So not quite as straightforward as it seemed. Looks like the probe bounced a couple of times (the first bounce taking two hours, the second 7 minutes. However, according to the news this morning, it has already sent back useful data. Exciting stuff!

[virtuo]

So not quite as straightforward as it seemed. Looks like the probe bounced a couple of times (the first bounce taking two hours, the second 7 minutes. However, according to the news this morning, it has already sent back useful data. Exciting stuff!

I heard they were worried it may be damaged after the bounces, but not heard anything else - they were "still waiting" as of about 8am in the car. Hopefully they've got a signal (and hopefully the solar panels are working so it'll last beyond it's expected 64 hour battery life).

It'd be a shame not to be able to answer the question on everyone's mind at the minute. "Do harpoons work in space?"

[peterb]

It'd be a shame not to be able to answer the question on everyone's mind at the minute. "Do harpoons work in space?"

I wondered if the reaction to firing the harpoons had re-launched it - but I'm sure that would have been considered?

But even so, it is an incredible achievement just to get this far.

[virtuo]

I wondered if the reaction to firing the harpoons had re-launched it - but I'm sure that would have been considered?

But even so, it is an incredible achievement just to get this far.

That's what the thruster on top was supposed to counteract, but they dropped the probe knowing the thruster wasn't working. Did the harpoons actually fire?

Reports said that the probe "sank" about 4cm on the surface, suggesting the comet absorbed some of the impact. If it was solid rock I think it would have just pinged off in to oblivion.