Alpha Centauri 2

Community => Recreation Commons => Destination: Alpha Centauri => Topic started by: Buster's Uncle on August 06, 2014, 06:16:47 pm

Title: Europe's Rosetta Spacecraft Makes Historic Arrival at Comet
Post by: Buster's Uncle on August 06, 2014, 06:16:47 pm

First Comet Close-Ups from Rosetta Spacecraft Reveal a 'Scientific Disneyland' (Photos)
SPACE.com
by Miriam Kramer, Staff Writer  1 hour ago


(http://l2.yimg.com/bt/api/res/1.2/4BZdDy4P0odllq_ZI9j5Bg--/YXBwaWQ9eW5ld3M7Zmk9ZmlsbDtoPTQzMTtweW9mZj0wO3E9NzU7dz01NzU-/http://media.zenfs.com/en_US/News/SPACE.com/First_Comet_Close-Ups_from_Rosetta-75f50f8932ffc98c3ce93e7d60b0dd6d)
Rosetta spacecraft's OSIRIS narrow-angle camera obtained this close-up detail of a smooth region on the "base" of the "body" section of comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko on August 6, 2014.



It's only been a few hours since Europe's Rosetta spacecraft arrived at a comet in deep space, but the robotic probe is already beaming incredible close-up photos of its target.

The latest images from the Rosetta probe reveal details on the surface of Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko like never before. House-size boulders can be seen on the surface of the comet, and the "neck," "body" and "head of the dirty snowball are all on stark display. The photos were taken when Rosetta was about 81 miles (130 kilometers) away from the comet.

"We've arrived. Ten years we've been in the car waiting to get to scientific Disneyland, and we haven't even gotten out of the car yet and look at what's outside the window," Mark McCaughrean, senior scientific adviser with the ESA's Directorate of Science and Robotic Exploration, said during a webcast of the Rosetta's comet arrival today (Aug. 6). "It's just astonishing."

And McCaughrean wasn't alone in his enthusiasm at Rosetta's mission operations center in Darmstadt, Germany.

"This is a very, very emotional moment," Holger Sierks, the principal investigator for Rosetta's OSIRIS instrument, said during the webcast. "You see a lot of detail coming out here. We see the bright areas. We see the head. We see the depression and a lot of stuff laid out there. We see the sides, the body, the lower body of the nucleus and a lot of detail."

Both Rosetta and Comet 67P/C-G are flying in tandem at about 251 million miles (405 million km) from Earth. Rosetta set off on its quest to link up with the comet in 2004, traveling about 4 billion miles (6.4 billion km) before making its historic rendezvous with the comet this morning.While today does mark an event 10 years in the making, it is just the beginning of the mission for many ESA scientists.


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Rosetta spacecraft's OSIRIS narrow-angle camera obtained this close-up detail of comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko on August 6, 2014. The comet’s "head" lies at the left, casting shadows onto the "neck" and "body" to the right.


ESA officials still need to find a suitable landing spot for the Philae lander, a robotic craft that hitched a ride with Rosetta to the comet. Philae (named for an obelisk found on an island in the Nile River) is designed to touch down on the surface of Comet 67P/G-C to learn more about the composition and properties of the 2.5-mile-wide (4 km) comet.

Mission controllers will now put Rosetta into a triangular orbit around Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko (67P/C-G) before moving the probe closer to the comet. Eventually, Rosetta will move into an even tighter circular orbit to release its lander down to the comet's surface in November.

The $1.7 billion (1.3 billion euros) Rosetta mission is expected to end in December 2015 when the spacecraft moves away from Comet 67P/C-G. Before the end of the mission, however, Rosetta will accompany the comet as it makes its closest pass of the sun in its 6.5-year orbit. During that close pass, the probe should be able to observe the comet in a very active state.

"After landing, Rosetta will continue to accompany the comet until its closest approach to the sun in August 2015 and beyond, watching its behavior from close quarters to give us a unique insight and real-time experience of how a comet works as it hurtles around the sun," Matt Taylor, Rosetta project scientist, said in a statement.


http://news.yahoo.com/first-comet-close-ups-rosetta-spacecraft-reveal-scientific-152257398.html (http://news.yahoo.com/first-comet-close-ups-rosetta-spacecraft-reveal-scientific-152257398.html)

Title: Rosetta probe to Orbit Comet After 10-Year Space Journey
Post by: Buster's Uncle on August 06, 2014, 08:27:10 pm

Rosetta to Orbit Comet After 10-Year Space Journey
ABC News
By Clayton Sandell and Gina Sunseri  Aug 5, 2014 8:16pm


(http://a.abcnews.com/images/Technology/HT_Rosetta_Philae_mar_140805_16x9_608.jpg)



A 10-year, nearly 4-billion-mile space journey will make history Wednesday when a tiny spacecraft begins the first-ever orbit of a comet that scientists believe may hold clues about the dawn of the solar system and life on Earth.

Since the European Space Agency launched the Rosetta mission in 2004, the craft has been on a cosmic ping-pong trip, using the gravitational forces of Earth and Mars to slingshot across roughly 3,728,227,139 miles of space toward comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko.

After a few months looking for the right place to land, in November Rosetta will log another first when it deploys a small, 220-pound lander called Philae to touch down on the surface to begin a close-up scientific exam.

If all goes well, Philae will fire a harpoon to anchor itself to the surface of the comet. It will then conduct a number of experiments, beaming results back to Earth.

“The best thing Philae is going to tell us is something that we have no clue what it is yet,” said Phil Plait, an astronomer and author who pens the Bad Astronomy blog for Slate.  ”And that’s the best part of science, when you get that surprise and you go, ‘Oh!’ And it changes the way you think about something.”

Along the way Rosetta has already produced stunning images as it zoomed by Mars and Earth, using the planets’ gravity to help slingshot it toward the comet.

“There are so many things that have never been attempted before,” said Samantha Cristoforetti, an Italian astronaut with the European Space Agency.  ”Rendezvousing with a comet, attempting a landing, relying purely on solar batteries at huge distances from the sun.”

In January, after a long hibernation to preserve battery power, Rosetta woke up and phoned home.

A tweet that read “Hello world!” sent from Rosetta’s account got more than 5,000 retweets.

Comet 67P, made up mostly of dust and ice, is gradually waking and will soon begin to form a long trail as it approaches the heat of the sun. As Rosetta has inched closer, it has been sending back increasingly-detailed pictures of 67P.

Comets, scientists believe, are a cosmic mish-mash of materials left over from the beginning of the solar system.

“They’re like a time capsule,” said Plait. “A four-and-a-half-billion-year-old time capsule telling us what conditions were like when the earth itself was just forming. That’s HUGE.”

When they collided with Earth, comets may have even delivered the water and ingredients needed to kickstart life.

“It could be that comets seeded the earth with the building blocks for life,” Plait says. “It’s very interesting to think that when you’re studying a comet, you’re studying something that is ancient and gorgeous and has had an impact on human culture, and may have literally had an impact on the water and life on Earth as well.”

Rosetta is named for the Rosetta Stone, a tablet discovered in 1799 that helped decipher the hieroglyphs of ancient Egypt.


http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/technology/2014/08/rosetta-to-orbit-comet-after-10-year-space-journey/ (http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/technology/2014/08/rosetta-to-orbit-comet-after-10-year-space-journey/)

Title: Comet chaser reaches target after 10-year chase
Post by: Buster's Uncle on August 06, 2014, 08:37:52 pm

Comet chaser reaches target after 10-year chase
Associated Press
By FRANK JORDANS  5 hours ago


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Close-up detail of comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko. The image was taken by Rosetta’s OSIRIS narrow-angle camera and downloaded Wednesday, Aug. 6, 2014. The image shows the comet’s ‘head’ at the left of the frame, which is casting shadow onto the ‘neck’ and ‘body’ to the right. The image was taken from a distance of 120 km and the image resolution is 2.2 meters per pixel. A mission to land the first space probe on a comet reaches a major milestone when the unmanned Rosetta spacecraft finally catches up with its quarry on Wednesday. It's a hotly anticipated rendezvous: Rosetta flew into space more than a decade ago and had to perform a series of complex maneuvers to gain enough speed to chase down the comet on its orbit around the sun. (AP Photo/ESA/Rosetta/MPS for OSIRIS Team )



DARMSTADT, Germany (AP) — After a journey of 6.4 billion kilometers (4 billion miles), Europe's unmanned Rosetta probe reached its destination Wednesday, a milestone in mankind's first attempt to land a spacecraft on a comet.

The decade-long trip was successfully completed with a seven-minute thrust that allowed Rosetta to swing alongside comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko somewhere between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter.

"This is your only chance to have a rendezvous with a comet," Jean-Jacques Dordain, director-general of the European Space Agency, told scientists and spectators at the mission control center in Darmstadt, Germany.

The goal of the mission is to orbit 67P at a distance of 100 kilometers (60 miles) and observe the comet as it hurtles toward the sun. If all goes according to plan, Rosetta will attempt the unprecedented feat of dropping a lander onto a comet in November.

Scientists hope that the information they collect will help them learn more about the origins of comets, stars and planets, said David Southwood, who oversaw the scientific part of the mission until his recent retirement.

"Comets are the stuff of which the solar system was originally made," he said. Some scientists have suggested that water, an essential element for the development of life, arrived on Earth from comets.


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Close up detail focusing on a smooth region on the ‘base’ of the ‘body’ section of comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko. The image was taken by Rosetta’s OSIRIS narrow-angle camera and downloaded Wednesday, Aug. 6, 2014. The image clearly shows a range of features, including boulders, craters and steep cliffs. The image was taken from a distance of 130 km and the image resolution is 2.4 meters per pixel. A mission to land the first space probe on a comet reaches a major milestone when the unmanned Rosetta spacecraft finally catches up with its quarry on Wednesday. It's a hotly anticipated rendezvous: Rosetta flew into space more than a decade ago and had to perform a series of complex maneuvers to gain enough speed to chase down the comet on its orbit around the sun. (AP Photo/ESA/Rosetta/MPS for OSIRIS Team )


Plans to bring material extracted from the comet back to Earth were canceled when NASA pulled out of a joint mission at an early stage, but the U.S. space agency contributed three of the 21 instruments aboard Rosetta and its Philae lander.

Scientists have already made a number of exciting observations as Rosetta hurtled through space at about 55,000 kph (34,000 mph) — a speed that required three loops around Earth and one around Mars to gain pace.

Recently released pictures taken by Rosetta show that 67P has an uneven shape that some have likened to a giant, four-kilometer (2.5-mile) long duck. This could mean that the comet is made up of two formerly distinct objects, or that it was heavily eroded.

The images, which have a resolution of 2.5 meters (eight feet) per pixel, also show steep 150-meter (490-feet) cliffs as well as smooth plains and house-sized boulders.

Scientists will spend the coming months analyzing the pictures Rosetta sends home to determine the best place to drop Philae. The lander will glide down to the comet before shooting a harpoon into its porous surface to avoid drifting off again.


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In this picture taken on Aug. 4, 2014 by Rosetta’s OSIRIS narrow-angle camera Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko is pictured from a distance of 234 kms. A mission to land the first space probe on a comet reaches a major milestone when the unmanned Rosetta spacecraft finally catches up with its quarry on Wednesday Aug 6, 2014. It's a hotly anticipated rendezvous: Rosetta flew into space more than a decade ago and had to perform a series of complex maneuvers to gain enough speed to chase down the comet on its orbit around the sun. The resolution has therefore been increased from 1024 x 1024 to 2048 x 2048 pixels. (AP Photo/ESA/Rosetta/MPS for OSIRIS Team )


Apart from the unprecedented landing, the orbiter section will also be the first to accompany a comet on its journey toward the sun, when 67P will begin to fizz and release the cloud of dust and ice that most people associate with comets. Measurements show that the comet is already losing the equivalent of two small glasses of water each second, an amount that will increase thousand-fold over the coming months.

"We're going to have a ringside seat to see, for the first time, a comet turn into a comet, to develop its tail and explain what for centuries mankind has been puzzled by," Southwood said.

While comets have long been associated with superstition, there is a real, albeit slim chance that such an object could one day hit Earth, causing a global catastrophe. Learning more about the nature of comets might help prevent that, Southwood said.

The spacecraft and its lander won't survive much beyond the end of next year, but the data they collect are expected to keep scientists busy for at least a decade. Rosetta, which has so far cost €1.3 billion ($1.74 billion), is one of the most high-profile missions for ESA, which is lobbying governments for its next four-year budget in December.

The European mission is different from NASA's Deep Impact spacecraft, which fired a projectile into a comet in 2005 to study the resulting plume of matter. NASA also landed a probe on an asteroid in 2001, but comets are much more volatile places because they constantly release dust and gas that can harm a spacecraft.

___

http://www.esa.int/rosetta (http://www.esa.int/rosetta)


http://news.yahoo.com/comet-chaser-reaches-target-10-chase-131425154.html (http://news.yahoo.com/comet-chaser-reaches-target-10-chase-131425154.html)

Title: Europe's Rosetta Spacecraft Makes Historic Arrival at Comet
Post by: Buster's Uncle on August 06, 2014, 08:43:12 pm

Europe's Rosetta Spacecraft Makes Historic Arrival at Comet
SPACE.com
by Miriam Kramer, Staff Writer  9 hours ago


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Wednesday marks a big moment for space exploration: After a few thruster rockets fire for a little over six minutes, a spacecraft called Rosetta will be in position to make the first-ever rendezvous with a comet. Photo: ESA



After a decade in space and 4 billion miles, Europe's Rosetta spacecraft has made history: For the first time ever, a robotic probe from Earth is flying with a comet and will soon enter orbit.

The European Space Agency's Rosetta spacecraft arrived at its target, Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko, today (Aug. 6) to end a 10-year journey across the solar system. The spacecraft performed an engine burn that brought it about 62 miles (100 kilometers) from the comet's surface.

Comet 67P/C-G and Rosetta are now flying about 251 million miles (450 million kilometers) from Earth. Engineers on the ground had to program the probe to go through a series of complicated burns and maneuvers to make the spacecraft's rendezvous with the comet a possibility.

"This is the end of 10 years of interplanetary flight," Rosetta Flight Director Andrea Accomazzo said during ESA's live comet rendezvous webcast Wednesday.

Applause broke out in Rosetta's mission control center in Darmstadt, Germany, where a crowd of ESA dignitaries and officials had gathered to watch the historic event.

"We're at the comet! Yes!" exclaimed Sylvain Lodiot, Rosetta's spacecraft operations manager, once the probe's successful arrival at Comet 67P/C-G was confirmed.


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ESA's Rosetta probe snapped this image of its target, Comet 67P on Aug. 3, 2014 from a distance of 177 miles (285 kilometers).


Now, Rosetta controllers will scope out different spots on the comet, to find a good place to land the Philae lander, a small spacecraft that is expected to touch down on the surface of the comet this November. Philae will drop to the comet's surface and make measurements of the cosmic body's physical properties.


From Earth to a comet

The $1.7 billion (1.3 billion euros) Rosetta comet mission launched in March 2004 to begin its history-making journey to Comet 67P/C-G. The spacecraft was originally slated to launch a year earlier and visit a different target, the Comet 46P/Wirtanen, but the mission was delayed and its destination changed following an unrelated rocket failure.

Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko was discovered in 1969 by Ukrainian astronomers Klim Churyumov and Svetlana Gerasimenko. It circles the sun once every 6.5 years, and the comet's farthest point in orbit takes it beyond Jupiter.

The spacecraft is named after the Rosetta Stone, an ancient Egyptian tablet vital to the translation of hieroglyphics. The Philae lander is named after an obelisk discovered on an island in the Nile River. Rosetta mission scientists hope that the orbiter and lander unlock secrets of the history of comets, and the solar system, just as their namesakes helped scientists decipher Egyptian writing.


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The crowd waits for Rosetta's arrival at Comet 67P on Aug. 6, 2014


Rosetta made several loops of Earth and Mars to help the probe gain speed and move past Jupiter's orbit. After getting past the gas giant and making a close flyby of two asteroids — Steins and Lutetia — Rosetta was put into a deep slumber in 2011 for nearly three years. It awoke from hibernation mode in January 2014 to the delight of nervous ESA mission scientists.

Paolo Ferri, head of ESA's mission operations, said during a live webcast Wednesday that compared to January's awakening from hibernation, Rosetta's arrival at Comet 67P/C-G was much less tense. The reason? Spacecraft controllers have known for months that Rosetta and Philae are in good health, as opposed to January, when the probe had been sleeping for years.


Comet surprises by Rosetta

The Rosetta spacecraft has captured remarkable views of the comet on its way into orbit. Images of the comet revealed that Comet 67P/C-G is actually two connected pieces hurtling through space together. The smaller "head" and larger "body" of the comet are connected by a bright "neck," as seen in photos of the comet taken by Rosetta.

"The only thing we know for sure at this point is that this neck region appear brighter compared to the head and body of the nucleus," Holger Sierks, of the Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research in Germany, said in a statement.

Rosetta has already collected enough data about the comet for scientists to know that the surface of Comet 67P is actually too warm to be ice-covered. Instead, ESA scientists think that the comet only has splotches of ice intermixed with a dusty crust.

Rosetta is expected to stay in orbit around Comet 67P/C-G until the end of 2015.

"We're going to going to ride along with this comet. We're going to have a ringside seat," Matt Taylor, ESA Rosetta project scientist, said Wednesday as the spacecraft arrived at Comet 67P/C-G. "It's going to be an awesome ride. Stay tuned."


http://news.yahoo.com/europes-rosetta-spacecraft-makes-historic-arrival-comet-103340287.html (http://news.yahoo.com/europes-rosetta-spacecraft-makes-historic-arrival-comet-103340287.html)

Title: Spacecraft Rosetta catches up to comet after 10-year chase
Post by: Buster's Uncle on August 06, 2014, 08:48:37 pm

Spacecraft Rosetta catches up to comet after 10-year chase
Reuters
By Maria Sheahan  8 hours ago


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A handout image of an artist's impression, not to scale, of the Rosetta orbiter deploying the Philae lander to comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko, released by the European Space Agency (ESA) on December 3, 2013. REUTERS/ESA–C. Carreau/ATG medialab/Handout via Reuters



FRANKFURT (Reuters) - European spacecraft Rosetta became the first ever to catch up with a comet on Wednesday, a landmark stage in a decade-long space mission that scientists hope will help unlock some of the secrets of the solar system.

Rosetta, launched by the European Space Agency (ESA) in 2004, will accompany comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko on its trip around the sun and land a probe on it later this year in an unprecedented maneuver.

Scientists are now on a tight schedule to learn enough about the comet using data from Rosetta to safely land the spacecraft's probe on it in November.

"We know what the comet's shape is. But we haven't really measured its gravity, we don't know yet where the center of mass is," Rosetta Flight Director Andrea Accomazzo told Reuters ahead of the rendezvous.

As it neared 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko this year, Rosetta took pictures revealing that it is not shaped, as had been assumed, like a rugby or American football, but rather comprises two segments connected by a neck, giving it an asymmetrical shape that has been likened to a duck.


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A handout photo of comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko by Rosetta’s OSIRIS narrow-angle camera on August 3, 2014 from a distance of 285 km (177 miles), made available by the European Space Agency (ESA) August 6, 2014. REUTERS/ESA/Rosetta/MPS for OSIRISTeamMPS/UPD/LAM/IAA/SSO/INTA/UPM/DASP/IDA/Handout via Reuters


Scientists hope data the probe gathers on the surface of the comet will allow them to peek into a kind of astronomical time capsule that has preserved for millions of years clues about what the world looked like when our solar system was born.

It has taken Rosetta 10 years, five months and four days to reach the comet, a roughly 3-by-5 km rock discovered in 1969. On its way, the spacecraft circled the sun on a widening spiral course, swinging past Earth and Mars to pick up speed and adjust its trajectory.

The mission performs several historical firsts, including the first time a spacecraft orbits a comet rather than just whizzing past to snap some fly-by pictures, and the first time a probe has landed on a comet.

Because the trip is so long and took Rosetta so far from the sun's solar rays, the spacecraft was put in a deep sleep for 31 months and woken up earlier this year.

There is little flexibility in Rosetta's schedule this year. The comet is still hurtling toward the inner Solar System at almost 55,000 km per hour, and the closer it gets to the sun the more active it will become, emitting gases that can make it difficult to predict the trajectory of Rosetta and its probe.

"We have a lot of time pressure to produce engineering models of a world that we don't know yet," said Accomazzo, based at the ESA's satellite operations in the German town of Darmstadt, south of Frankfurt, who has been working on the Rosetta mission since 1997.


http://news.yahoo.com/spacecraft-rosetta-catches-comet-10-chase-110155131--sector.html (http://news.yahoo.com/spacecraft-rosetta-catches-comet-10-chase-110155131--sector.html)

Title: 'Face' on Comet 67P Spotted by Rosetta Spacecraft (Photo)
Post by: Buster's Uncle on August 06, 2014, 10:32:04 pm

'Face' on Comet 67P Spotted by Rosetta Spacecraft (Photo)
SPACE.com
by Tariq Malik, Managing Editor  16 minutes ago


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German Aerospace Center's youth portal DLR_next tweeted this photo showing the "face" on Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko, Aug. 6, 2014.



If you're a fan of the "Face on Mars," then you might just have a new best friend. A new photo from Europe's Rosetta spacecraft has captured what appears to be a face on a comet in deep space, even if it's only a fun optical illusion.

Rosetta captured the photo of Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko on Sunday (Aug. 3) while en route to its historic arrival at the comet earlier today (Aug. 6). The image shows the 2.5-mile-wide (4 kilometers) comet in its entirety, with the face illusion visible on the right side of the comet.

Officials with the German Aerospace Center's youth portal DLR_next (@DLR_next) spotted the optical illusion and pointed it out on Twitterwith several tongue-in-cheek posts today. DLR is one of the European Space Agency members participating in the Rosetta comet-chasing mission.

Seeing faces in space photos is nothing new. They are examples of pareidolia, in which the human brain perceives faces, animals or other shape patterns in random images.

A photo taken by NASA's Viking 1 Mars orbiter in 1976 sparked infamous claims of a "Face on Mars." Subsequent observations by other spacecraft, like NASA's Mars Global Surveyor and Europe's Mars Express, have proven the Face on Mars was just a trick of light and shadows.

Other examples of false sightings in space include a rat on Mars, an alien Bio Base and — most recently — a strange flash of light captured by NASA's Curiosity rover.

Rosetta arrived at Comet 67P/C-G (as it is known) after a 10-year and 4-billion-mile chase (6.4 billion km) across the solar system. The probe has already begun snapping stunning close-up photos of the comet.

Rosetta is the first spacecraft ever to orbit a comet and will spend the next year and a half studying Comet 67P/C-G in extraordinary detail. In November, Rosetta is expected to drop its lander Philae onto the comet's surface for an even closer look.


http://news.yahoo.com/face-comet-67p-spotted-rosetta-spacecraft-photo-211021906.html (http://news.yahoo.com/face-comet-67p-spotted-rosetta-spacecraft-photo-211021906.html)

Title: “We are here” — Rosetta spacecraft becomes the first to rendezvous with a comet
Post by: Buster's Uncle on August 07, 2014, 12:21:02 am

“We are here” — Rosetta spacecraft becomes the first to rendezvous with a comet
Gigaom
By David Meyer  12 hours ago


(https://gigaom2.files.wordpress.com/2014/08/comet-7p-churyumov-gerasimenko.jpg?w=300&h=200&crop=1)


Early on Wednesday, the Rosetta spacecraft – launched over a decade ago – rendezvoused with the 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko comet as planned. The spacecraft will now accompany the comet on its solar orbit for a year.

YES @Philae2014! WE’RE HERE!! After 10 years 5 months 4 days we are finally at our destination, #comet #67P :-)—
ESA Rosetta Mission (@ESA_Rosetta) August 06, 2014

This is a first for humanity, and it should give us an unprecedented view into the nature of comets. Rosetta is currently accompanying the comet from a 100-km (62-mile) distance, but the European Space Agency (ESA), which is behind the mission, hopes to get closer than 30 km. Rosetta already studied a couple of asteroids in close detail while en route to its date with 67P.


(https://gigaom2.files.wordpress.com/2014/01/screen-shot-2014-01-15-at-5-05-58-pm.png?w=300&h=189)


“After ten years, five months and four days traveling towards our destination, looping around the Sun five times and clocking up 6.4 billion kilometers, we are delighted to announce finally ‘we are here,'” ESA Director-General Jean-Jacques Dordain said in a statement.

As Rosetta approached 67P over recent months, it was already able to take certain measurements – the comet is apparently spitting out 300 milliliters of water vapor each second and its average temperature is around -70 degrees C (-94 degrees F). As you can see in the above image, it has two distinct segments, and the ESA is keen to figure out whether that’s the result of erosion or the ancient fusion of two separate comets.

In the coming months, the ESA scientists will try to find a good landing spot for the Philae lander, which will attach itself to the surface with harpoons. Philae has 10 scientific instruments on board for analyzing the dark, dusty comet’s composition.


https://gigaom.com/2014/08/06/we-are-here-rosetta-spacecraft-becomes-the-first-to-rendezvous-with-a-comet/?utm_medium=content&utm_campaign=syndication&utm_source=yfinance&utm_content=we-are-here-rosetta-spacecraft-becomes-the-first-to-rendezvous-with-a-comet_863076

Title: Comet joined by space probe after 10-year pursuit
Post by: Buster's Uncle on August 07, 2014, 12:25:41 am

Comet joined by space probe after 10-year pursuit
Associated Press
By FRANK JORDANS  5 hours ago


(http://l1.yimg.com/bt/api/res/1.2/PLGsx8EVrDyD.YclcRJaHA--/YXBwaWQ9eW5ld3M7Zmk9ZmlsbDtoPTk0NTtweW9mZj0wO3E9NzU7dz05NDU-/http://media.zenfs.com/en_us/News/ap_webfeeds/94d071d2b5a2051e5c0f6a706700209b.jpg)
Close-up detail of comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko. The image was taken by Rosetta’s OSIRIS narrow-angle camera and downloaded Wednesday, Aug. 6, 2014. The image shows the comet’s ‘head’ at the left of the frame, which is casting shadow onto the ‘neck’ and ‘body’ to the right. The image was taken from a distance of 120 km and the image resolution is 2.2 meters per pixel. A mission to land the first space probe on a comet reaches a major milestone when the unmanned Rosetta spacecraft finally catches up with its quarry on Wednesday. It's a hotly anticipated rendezvous: Rosetta flew into space more than a decade ago and had to perform a series of complex maneuvers to gain enough speed to chase down the comet on its orbit around the sun. (AP Photo/ESA/Rosetta/MPS for OSIRIS Team )



DARMSTADT, Germany (AP) — Turning what seemed like a science fiction tale into reality, an unmanned probe swung alongside a comet on Wednesday after a 4-billion mile (6.4-billion kilometer) chase through outer space over the course of a decade.

Europe's Rosetta probe will orbit and study the giant ball of dust and ice as it hurtles toward the sun and, if all goes according to plan, drop a lander onto the comet in the coming months.

Rosetta turned up as planned for its "rendezvous" with comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko somewhere between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter.

The incredible trip, launched in 2004, marks a milestone in mankind's effort to understand the mysterious shooting stars that periodically flash past Earth, and which have often been viewed with fear and trepidation.

While the moon, Mars and even asteroids have been visited, no spacecraft has yet gotten so close to a comet. Having achieved this feat, Rosetta will go one step further and drop a lander on 67P's icy surface — a maneuver planned for November.

"You can compare what we've done so far to finding a speck of dust in a big city," said Gerhard Schwehm, who was lead scientist on the Rosetta mission until his recent retirement.


(http://l2.yimg.com/bt/api/res/1.2/GEsOTi2cJq3iHUYNPIG1gw--/YXBwaWQ9eW5ld3M7Zmk9ZmlsbDtoPTYzMjtweW9mZj0wO3E9NzU7dz05NjA-/http://media.zenfs.com/en_us/News/ap_webfeeds/f6b7aff7b4b0011e5c0f6a7067001800.jpg)
Experts watch their screens at the control center of the European Space Agency, ESA, in Darmstadt, Germany, Wednesday, Aug. 6, 2014. A mission to land the first space probe on a comet reaches a major milestone when the unmanned Rosetta spacecraft finally catches up with its quarry on Wednesday. It's a hotly anticipated rendezvous: Rosetta flew into space more than a decade ago and had to perform a series of complex maneuvers to gain enough speed to chase down comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko on its orbit around the sun. (AP Photo/dpa, Boris Roessler)


That's probably an understatement.

To catch their quarry, scientists at the European Space Agency had to overcome a series of hurdles that included a last-minute change of destination — after a carrier rocket failure delayed launch — and a tense hibernation period of 31 months during which the probe was out of contact with ground stations.

Before Rosetta swung alongside 67P with a final thrust Wednesday, the spacecraft also had to accelerate to 55,000 kph (34,000 mph) — a speed that required three loops around Earth and one around Mars.

Underlining the singular achievement, ESA's director-general Jean-Jacques Dordain told scientists and spectators at the mission control center in Darmstadt, Germany: "This is your only chance to have a rendezvous with a comet."

Rosetta will now spend several months observing 67P from a safe distance of up to 100 kilometers (60 miles). This will give scientists time to find a safe place to land Rosetta's sidekick, Philae.


(http://l3.yimg.com/bt/api/res/1.2/LJYVM5RXBiME6Y8o_09apw--/YXBwaWQ9eW5ld3M7Zmk9ZmlsbDtoPTEyMzI7cHlvZmY9MDtxPTc1O3c9OTYw/http://media.zenfs.com/en_us/News/ap_webfeeds/e4d36e1cb5cb061e5c0f6a706700bb18.jpg)
Director General of the European Space Agency, ESA, Jean-Jacques Dordain watches the Rosetta flight on a screen at the ESA in Darmstadt, Germany, Wednesday, Aug. 6, 2014. After a journey of 6.4 billion kilometers (4 billion miles), Europe's unmanned Rosetta probe reached its destination Wednesday, a milestone in mankind's first attempt to land a spacecraft on a comet. "This is your only chance to have a rendezvous with a comet," Dordain told scientists and spectators at the mission control center. (AP Photo/dpa, Boris Roessler)


This maneuver will pose an unprecedented challenge because there will be no second shot. Recent pictures of 67P show that its surface is porous, with steep cliffs and house-sized boulders.

One person involved with Rosetta from the start told The Associated Press that the landing was "mission impossible" with only a slim chance of success. He spoke on condition of anonymity to avoid harming his employer.

Even if the landing fails, Rosetta itself will remain in the comet's orbit until at least the end of 2015, gathering reams of data with its 11 on-board sensors. As 67P gets closer to the sun it will begin to fizz and release the cloud of dust and ice that most people associate with comets.

"We're going to have a ringside seat to see, for the first time, a comet turn into a comet, to develop its tail and explain what for centuries mankind has been puzzled by," said David Southwood, a former president of the Royal Astronomical Society who was involved with the Rosetta mission from the start.

Overall, scientists hope the €1.3 billion ($1.74 billion) mission will help them learn more about the origins of comets, stars, planets and maybe even life on Earth, he said.


(http://l3.yimg.com/bt/api/res/1.2/iew8jXRZ.cq2z6ZqpO4obA--/YXBwaWQ9eW5ld3M7Zmk9ZmlsbDtoPTcwOTtweW9mZj0wO3E9NzU7dz05NDU-/http://media.zenfs.com/en_us/News/ap_webfeeds/518d0dacb587051e5c0f6a7067001d0b.jpg)
Close up detail focusing on a smooth region on the ‘base’ of the ‘body’ section of comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko. The image was taken by Rosetta’s OSIRIS narrow-angle camera and downloaded Wednesday, Aug. 6, 2014. The image clearly shows a range of features, including boulders, craters and steep cliffs. The image was taken from a distance of 130 km and the image resolution is 2.4 meters per pixel. A mission to land the first space probe on a comet reaches a major milestone when the unmanned Rosetta spacecraft finally catches up with its quarry on Wednesday. It's a hotly anticipated rendezvous: Rosetta flew into space more than a decade ago and had to perform a series of complex maneuvers to gain enough speed to chase down the comet on its orbit around the sun. (AP Photo/ESA/Rosetta/MPS for OSIRIS Team )


Mark McCaughrean, a senior scientific advisor at ESA, predicted plenty of surprises ahead.

"With this comet, every time we see a new image the jaws drop," he said. "Everybody just can't believe how lucky we have been."

___

http://www.esa.int/rosetta (http://www.esa.int/rosetta)


http://news.yahoo.com/rosetta-space-probe-set-catch-comet-064345586.html (http://news.yahoo.com/rosetta-space-probe-set-catch-comet-064345586.html)

Title: A timeline of Rosetta probe's 10-year journey
Post by: Buster's Uncle on August 07, 2014, 12:33:20 am

A timeline of Rosetta probe's 10-year journey
Associated Press
By The Associated Press  4 hours ago


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In this picture taken on Aug. 3, 2014 by Rosetta’s OSIRIS narrow-angle camera Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko is pictured from a distance of 285 kms. A mission to land the first space probe on a comet reaches a major milestone when the unmanned Rosetta spacecraft finally catches up with its quarry on Wednesday Aug 6, 2014. It's a hotly anticipated rendezvous: Rosetta flew into space more than a decade ago and had to perform a series of complex maneuvers to gain enough speed to chase down the comet on its orbit around the sun. The image resolution is 5.3 metres/pixel. (AP Photo/ESA/Rosetta/MPS for OSIRIS Team )



DARMSTADT, Germany (AP) — Europe's unmanned space probe Rosetta completed a decade-long journey on Wednesday to link up with a comet. The probe will orbit and study the giant ball of dust and ice as it hurtles toward the sun before attempting to drop a lander onto the comet in the coming months.

Here's a look at key moments during Rosetta's incredible trip:

___

March 2, 2004: Europe's unmanned probe Rosetta takes off from Kourou, French Guiana, after a series of delays, including an abandoned January 2003 launch window because of a rocket problem.

Feb. 25, 2007: Rosetta carries out a close flyby of Mars. European Space Agency's mission control breaks out in applause after the end of 15 tense minutes of radio silence as the craft passes behind the Red Planet.

Sept. 5, 2008: Probe successfully passes close to an asteroid 250 million miles from Earth. The spacecraft loses its radio signal for 90 minutes as planned during the flyby of the Steins asteroid, also known as Asteroid 2867.

July 10, 2010: Between Mars and Jupiter, Rosetta transmits its first pictures from the largest asteroid ever visited by a satellite after it flies by Lutetia as close as 1,900 miles (3,200 kilometers). It is the closest look to date of the Lutetia asteroid.

Jan. 20, 2014: Waking after almost three years of hibernation, Rosetta sends its first signal back to Earth, prompting cheers from scientists. Systems had been powered down in 2011 to conserve energy, leaving scientists in the dark for 31 months.

Aug. 6, 2014: Rosetta swings alongside comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko somewhere between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter.

November 2014: The probe will try to drop a lander on the comet's icy surface.


http://news.yahoo.com/timeline-rosetta-probes-10-journey-191033098.html (http://news.yahoo.com/timeline-rosetta-probes-10-journey-191033098.html)

Title: Rosetta Mission Reaches Comet
Post by: Buster's Uncle on August 07, 2014, 04:04:42 am

Rosetta Mission Reaches Comet
Probe and 67P Comet Locked in Common Orbit Around the Sun
The Wall Street Journal
By Gautam Naik  Aug. 6, 2014 7:53 p.m. ET



A European spacecraft called Rosetta has become the first in history to rendezvous with and orbit a comet, a milestone in space exploration that could reveal valuable clues about how the solar system was created and how it evolved.

On Wednesday, Rosetta and the comet were hurtling side by side at roughly 34,000 miles per hour, locked in a common orbit around the sun, some 250 million miles from Earth, said the Paris-based European Space Agency, or ESA, which masterminded the mission.

While other craft have briefly flown near comets, this is the first time a spacecraft has entered into early orbit around a comet and, more ambitiously, planned to fly extremely close to one and make a detailed study of it over many months.

The comet's 6½-year orbit will eventually take it far beyond Jupiter, and Rosetta will keep it company for a year of that journey.

During that time, a probe from Rosetta will attempt a highly risky and unprecedented landing on the comet's surface, a kind of story line that is more typically fodder for Hollywood movies.

There will be further excitement as the comet gets closer to the sun. The craft's instruments are then expected to capture the transformation as the intense heat boils off the comet's icy nucleus and generates the bright halo and iron-and-dust tails that are typical of comets.

The close encounter has been a long time coming.

The comet-chasing project was first discussed in the 1970s. It was approved in 1993, and Rosetta was launched into space in 2004. The price tag for the project is €1.3 billion ($1.74 billion).

"We are delighted to announce finally 'we are here,' " said Jean-Jacques Dordain, ESA's director-general. He said the craft had to travel four billion miles over 10 years in order to keep its appointment with the comet, known as 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko. En route, it made five trips around the sun and three gravity-assist flybys of Earth and one of Mars.


(http://si.wsj.net/public/resources/images/BN-DZ571_0806ro_G_20140806085934.jpg)
A handout photo of comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko by Rosetta's narrow-angle camera on Aug. 3 from a distance of 177 miles, made available by the European Space Agency on Wednesday. Reuters


Pictures beamed back from the craft show a comet about 2½ miles in diameter with two segments joined by a "neck," giving it a duck-like appearance.

The surface seems to be dark and dusty rather than clean and icy. The landscape is punctuated by cliffs, plains and large fissures.

The scientists hope the celestial meeting will yield a wealth of scientific insights about how the solar system evolved.

Comets are leftovers that never got incorporated into the planets during the formation of the solar system 4.6 billion years ago.

Their materials are the very stuff—preserved virtually intact—of those crucial, early days.

"They are icy treasure chests" containing valuable clues such as dust, water and organic materials, said Mark McCaughrean, astronomer and senior science adviser at the ESA. "Rosetta is there to unlock that treasure chest."

Consider the mystery of water on Earth. Because the early planet was too hot for water to be created via typical chemical processes, some scientists have suggested that ice-bearing comets could have seeded Earth with the liquid. To shed light on that question, Rosetta's instruments will analyze the water on comet P67 and see if it has the same isotopic composition as water on Earth.

Another theory suggests comets could have similarly brought along the early ingredients of life, such as amino acids, which, in turn, make proteins.

In 2009, a U.S. spacecraft discovered the amino acid glycine on a comet, the first such discovery. Rosetta's instruments will check to see whether 67P's surface contains any such organic materials and how different they are from similar substances on Earth.


(http://si.wsj.net/public/resources/images/WO-AT286_ROSETT_G_20140806124805.jpg)


http://online.wsj.com/articles/rosetta-mission-reaches-comet-in-first-for-space-travel-1407322701?ru=yahoo?mod=yahoo_itp (http://online.wsj.com/articles/rosetta-mission-reaches-comet-in-first-for-space-travel-1407322701?ru=yahoo?mod=yahoo_itp)

Title: Re: Europe's Rosetta Spacecraft Makes Historic Arrival at Comet
Post by: Geo on August 07, 2014, 03:58:26 pm

 ;woohoo
And already an alien connection? ;lol ;b; ("the face" I mean ;) ).