Rosetta in orbit!
 

Around a comet.

How about something nice? We could use it I think :o

"After a 10-year chase taking it billions of miles across the solar system, the Rosetta spacecraft made history Wednesday as it became the first probe to rendezvous with a comet on its journey around the sun.

"Thruster burn complete. Rosetta has arrived at comet 67P. We're in orbit!" announced the European Space Agency, which is leading the ambitious project, on Twitter.

Rosetta fired its thrusters on its final approach to Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko, known as "Chury" for short, on Wednesday morning. Half an hour after the burn, scientists announced that the craft had entered into the orbit of the streaking comet.

............

"The pictures coming back so far look intriguing -- and imagine the kind of scenes we can expect when Philae lands this coming November," he said.

To get to its destination the spacecraft has covered more than three billion miles and as the comet hurtles towards the sun it will reach a speed of about 62,000 miles per hour.

The mission has now achieved the first of what it hopes will be a series of historic accomplishments. In November mission controllers aim to place the robotic lander Philae on the surface -- something that has never been done before.

Previous missions have performed comet fly-bys but Rosetta is different. This probe will follow the comet for more than a year, mapping and measuring how it changes as it is blasted by the sun's energy.

........"

http://www.cnn.com/2014/08/06/world/...omet-approach/

Pete

They tweeted to Shatner, "Comet on screen, Captain. Sensor scans in progress and hailing frequencies open." :D

Pete

I remember this from pre-pubescent summer camp:

"Comet, it makes your mouth turn greeeeeeeeen!

Comet, it tastes like gas o leeeeeene!

Comet, it makes you vomit, so get some Comet, and vomit, today!"

Ah, charming youth.

Pete

I remember that one Pete, except we sang "Listerene", not "gasoline"

Another classic-

McDonald's is your kind of place,
they feed you rattlesnakes.
Hamburgers up your nose,
French fries between your toes.

And don't forget their golden shakes,
they're made from polluted lakes.

McDonald's is your kind of place.

That's cool! I'd bet a lot of the old kids songs got around.

I remember another one, 'My mother gave me a penny, to go and see Jack Benny, but did I see Jack Benny NOOOOOOOO... instead, I bought bubblegum. Ba oombaoomba bubblegum, etc, nickel, pickle, can't remember the rest.

Pete

Damn the ESA, buncha Limeys, Frogs and Krauts. :D

Pete, you're a geek. :D

Regards,

D-Ray

Freaks and geeks unite! :D http://www.latimes.com/science/la-sc...ry.html#page=1

Wait a second, that came out weird... :o

:D

Pete

Philae lands tomorrow!

Pete

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AvkPFXdpOQQ

:D

Pete

Philae has landed!

Pete

ESA is great!

Congrats to ESA HK :D What an incredible mission.

Pete

This precision in a half billion kilometers is indeed amazing. I hope they will get a lot of information about questions like how water came on our earth.

Brilliant success for the ESA! Very nice work!

That is quite impressive, but pales in comparison to our NASA Muslim outreach mission.:rolleyes:

Cool stuff!! Congrats to the ESA!! The pics are neat-o.

Ah, thank you for adding some senseless partisan snark. Now the thread is complete.

If threads were complete when senseless partisan snark was added, this site would be dead.

You wish.

You were expecting maybe something intelligent?:)

It's kindergarten time again. Pity. It is such an impressive event but there is abvioulsly no need of an interesting discussion here.

Stay the course, Chris. Rosetta is far more fascinating.

The accomplishment of landing a probe on a comet half a billion kilometers away and which is traveling faster than 40K miles per hour is simply mind boggling. Congrats for a great accomplishment. I love this picture of sheer joy after a 10 year mission.

http://rack.0.mshcdn.com/media/ZgkyM...a-reaction.jpg

Indeed it is, a very significant accomplishment and watching PBS Newshour coverage last evening it seems that the project leader was a woman.

Philea had some difficulties, it landed three times, because it had been pushed back two times. Between the first and second attempt there were two hours, between the second and third attempt some minutes.

It just did a couple of touch-and-goes, for practice.

J was the actual landing strip, but now they assume Philae being in the region of B. This position is much more unflattering because it makes the supply with energy more difficult.

Philea's weight in the low (almost non-existant) gravity is effectively 1 gram

That is fascinating! 1 gram...!

This is incredible isn't it? It's sad that the US is no longer a world leader in anything. But there certainly was a time..... now all we do is bicker with each other over whether to have a civilized and intelligent society or not.

Congratulations to the Europeans for being the adults in the world and moving forward.

Wow! The European Space Agency managed to achieve this with all that "Soshialism" and without the help of Ted Cruz?

WTF? How is that possible?

:p

Dave

Umm because they don't have a Ted Cruz?

You kidding me?
How about Facebook, Twitter, Instagram? And with Google and Microsoft, we rule the world and Apple keeps the world happy. :D

That figure is absolutely astonishing. Less than the typical tracking weight of a cartridge.

Really, even a high compliance cart will run ~1.2 to 1.5g.

Dave

That thing must be balanced better than a Swiss watch to keep Newton's third law from knocking it over whenever it moves anything.

Shame about the troubles. Obviously, the fact it landed at all is because of the GOP win, and the fact it bounced and landed on its side is because Obama is still Pres :D

Even if it didn't land at all what has already been done is nothing short of a miracle. I hope that their efforts to extend it work, and that whatever info it can send back help our understanding.

This is older but after watching it with a few beers in me proclaimed to the SO 'this is a GREAT sci vid'!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mf1zsACcXc4

Pete

Naw, it's a classic videogame. Asteroids, when you're down to one asteroid.

it will be neat when the saucer shows up....