Subject: Philae status update.
Author:
Posted on: 2014-11-12 20:18:00 UTC
Apparently harpoons are tricky. So there's three methods for keeping the lander on its new prize - but the thruster's broken, the harpoons didn't fire, and the gravity's ridiculously low.
Science! At least we're doing it all in the same units this time.
hS
Philae: I landed!
I'm on a comet.
I'm okay and I'm on a comet.
... the number of things the human race has landed a spaceship on just went up by one.
(Venus, Mars, the Moon, Titan, Eros, Itokawa... and 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko. Nice one, Philae)
hS
(PS: Image obviously courtesy xkcd; the flip book that is today's comic can be viewed in its entirety here. ~hS)
Yes, we're still finding out more about what exactly happened during that landing.
This fascinating compilation photo shows Philae in flight on its first approach, and astonishingly, actually shows its footprints from that initial landing. There's also one shot of it hurtling away again, which combined with the previous image, should surely make it possible to calculate its trajectory after bouncing? Of course, gravitational fields around a non-spherical object aren't exactly easy to calculate, so maybe not.
Still, though, fascinating pictures - and you can actually see the lander spinning in the shots!
Also, xkcd's forums provide this. Yeah, thanks, guys, that's not helping.
hS
They haven't seen Philae yet in its current landing spot - but they've calculated where it is. No idea yet whether they're aiming to get Rosatta to snap a picture of it, but I at least hope so.
hS
I adore the pictures Rosetta and Philae took of each other during separation.
I love the little sequence of shots Rosetta took of Philae as it fell away. Now, y'know, if only it could take one of Philae on the comet...
These might have to be purloined for my website. I have a whole page of spaceships taking photos of other spaceships. It's faintly adorable.
(Though, come to think of it, I really ought to add the Surveyor 3/Apollo 12 meetup...)
hS
Philae on (or above) the comet
Yes, there's a shot of Philae-the-tiny-dot flying lazily above the comet after its initial bounce - and of the dust cloud it kicked up. Surely that should make it easier to figure out where it ended up...?
hS
xkcd for the win. Whoooooo!!
For SCIENCE!
-Phobos
Apparently harpoons are tricky. So there's three methods for keeping the lander on its new prize - but the thruster's broken, the harpoons didn't fire, and the gravity's ridiculously low.
Science! At least we're doing it all in the same units this time.
hS
Philae: I landed!
I'm on a comet.
I'm okay and I'm on a comet.
(Trimmed + shrunk from this)
Apparently Philae is upright (that's good!) and taking pictures (that's brilliant!). And it's found a nice shady spot to nestle down in... shame about those solar panels, eh?
So yeah. We landed on a comet. ^-^ All they need to do now is decide whether to risk firing the harpoons and maybe send it flying again.
Oh, and all that science stuff, I guess.
hS
Basically... basically Philae's in very genteel trouble. The primary battery had 60 hours life in it, which will run out early tomorrow morning GMT - probably around midnight tonight if you're in America. The secondary batteries need 5 watts* to boot up the lander, and only have ~3 on them, because of the sunlight situation - the landing spot only gives ~1.5 hours of light to the solar panel, rather than the 7 they were after (per 12-hour day)
*Apparently. That doesn't make a lot of sense as a unit, but that's what I'm reading.
They think Philae is sitting with two legs on the ground, and the third - the one in the picture on the last post - slightly raised. They have managed to get most of the science done, and have actually deployed the drill - no results yet that I know of.
The next communication slot is 9-11 tonight GMT (so about, eh, mid-afternoon in America?); they think they'll get through, but it may be the last contact that works. So they're considering whether to try the various things that could shift Philae to get more light on its solar panels.
So yeah. It's not what everyone was hoping for - but at the end of the day, hey! We landed on a comet. That's pretty good going.
hS
...that we institute International Comet Day.
(And US, can we please replace Columbus Day with that instead, this one's much nicer.)
(Also, disclaimer, the idea was originally Araeph's, not mine.)