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

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