[UPDATE]
Some more links to watch:
Here is the website of the team who are operating the lander, they also have livestream footage on their site.
Their Twitter feed is: https://twitter.com/DLR_en or @DLR_de for updates in German.
And don’t miss the Lander’s twitter feed : https://twitter.com/Philae2014
And the current xkcd update:
Make your plans now to be free in two hours. As I woke up late today (6:30 a.m.), I got this bulletin in my CNN News feed, and was reminded that today is really a historic day for the human species:
Comet landing probe Philae has been released from orbiter Rosetta and has begun its 7-hour descent to land on the surface of Comet 67P, ESA says.
“There is no going back now,” the agency said after the spacecraft’s lander was released for its trip to the surface.
How exciting! Last August I wrote a longish post describing the European Space Agency’s mission to land a space probe on a comet, and you can read all about that here. All has gone well so far. As I mentioned (read the earlier piece), the orbiter Rosetta will release a 100-kg lander, Philae, which will touch down on the small comet and sent us all sorts of scientific information. Well, Philae is on its way!
Here’s the comet, 67 P, as seen from Rosetta:
The comet is not large: the size of only part of London:
Here’s Philae:
The landing is scheduled to take place at 10:37 Eastern Standard Time in the U.S., which would be 3:37 (15:37) London time, only a bit more than two hours from right now. You can bet I’ll be watching in my hotel (the link for watching it live is below). We won’t see the images until 11:02 EST (16:37 London time).
To show how remarkable this achievement is, the chase from Earth to the comet was a complicated pathway 6 billion km long; the journey started more than ten years ago (March 2004); and the landing probe will have to touch down on a comet travelling 55,000 kilometers per hour. Now that is accuracy! If the rendezvous is successful, it will be a remarkable achievement for an overcerebralized primate.
By now you should be asking yourself, “How can I watch this live?” It’s easy, just go to the Rosetta Website, where there’s a live feed to watch the landing here. Don’t miss it; this won’t happen again in our lifetime. The Tw**er feed is here), and here are a few images from the Twitter link, which updates constantly. But who needs Twi**er when you can watch it live?
Also, over on xkcd, Randall Munroe is doing his own version of a live-stream. The xkcd page will update as the mission continues: http://xkcd.com/1446/
Below is a cool video from the IIEE website showing how the landing will look, should it occur:
And they add this information:
A successful landing would allow Philae to transmit the first images ever taken from a comet’s surface and then to drill into the surface. The lander’s investigation could help reveal whether comets helped deliver some of Earth’s first water or the chemical ingredients for life on Earth.
Philae’s approach will involve about 7 hours of free fall to cover the distance of 22.5 kilometers between the Rosetta mother ship and the comet’s surface, according to the Planetary Society. Once the lander’s three legs absorb the landing shock, Philae will anchor itself in the comet’s surface by firing two harpoons while using a thruster to counteract the force of the harpoons. Each of the three feet will also deploy ice screws.
If the landing succeeds, mission controllers expect to receive a radio signalconfirming the landing at about 11:02 AM EST. The lander would also deploy a radio antenna used by the CONSERT (Comet Nucleus Sounding Experiment by Radiowave Transmission) experiment, which is designed to study the inside of the comet by reflecting radio waves off the celestial body’s solid nucleus. A full list of scientific instruments on the orbiter and lander can be found on the European Space Agency’s website.
The lander’s primary battery only has enough power to keep the mission active on the comet’s surface for about two-and-a-half days — enough time to complete a first series of scientific measurements. But a second phase of the lander’s mission that runs on backup batteries recharged by solar cells could potentially last up to three months.
. . . The Rosetta mission first launched from Earth in 2004, but the spacecraft entered a 31-month hibernation period starting on 8 June 2011 and ending on 20 January 2014. That record-breaking hibernation period for a satellite kept Rosetta’s consumption of power and fuel to a minimum during the longest and coldest leg of its journey.
Don’t miss it. Nothing like this has ever been done before.
h/t: Michael, Grania
If only the comet could settle down exactly on that bit of Westminster!
It could be part of a Doctor Who episode!
And if it could just mover over a bit and get Battersea Power Station, too: a disgusting eyesore that is now regarded as part of Our Heritage…
Maybe it can explore Battersea for flying pigs as well.
Obscure Pink Floyd reference.
It could be part of a Doctor Who episode!
Only if the comet hatches.
That show has been running for so long that it probably IS part of a Dr. Who episode.
WOW ! I lived for many years in Westminster at the very place where the two lines on the map intersect. Hasn’t Battersea Power Station been gentrified as some kind of art gallery or something ?
Gentrified, yes – and that makes it worse! Ugly and industrial has a sort of honesty, but ‘gentrified’, so that the likes of Prince Charles can appreciate it…
Fingers, toes & everything crossed!
Watching the live feed from ESA as I type. FREAKIN’AWESOME!!
Other feeds are available if the official one gets hammered. In the UK, the Beeb, Guardian and the Telegraph ( plus one or two others I guess) are streaming the landing.
The Rosetta space probe is trying to land on a comet 300 million miles away. I expect religious fundamentalists don’t believe such a place exists. Sent to selected friends.
Reblogged this on Rainbowman56's Blog.
XKCD is live-cartooning the landing:
http://xkcd.com/
What is cool about that is that the cartoon updates by hitting ‘reload’.
It’s very glitchy.
This other link to the live-‘toon worked better for me. I can click it backward or forward. It helped me to catch up on events while I was away.
Cool! the ESA landed the probe on a comet.
Too nervous to watch. This is why I like physics and not engineering…they are braver.
Reminds me of:
If Scotty says it will take an hour to fix, he can do it in five minutes.
If a physicists says it will take an hour to fix, then it will be at least 3.14 times an hour.
“The impossible we do at once. Miracles take longer.”
Confirmation of a landing should be received about 11:03 a.m. ET even though the landing is earlier (takes that long for the data to make it back)
Science! It’s just awesome!
Meanwhile in religion: same as yesterday. Same as the day before yesterday. Same as … you get the point …
//
This is probably the most fantastic event since landing on the moon.
Proof that science can fly you to a comet. Religion? Well, it still flies you only into buildings.
Sky News just announced that the landing would be “about 4 o’clock Earth Time”…
Facepalm ….
What does that correspond to in Spacetime?
Time is complex.
Yes, but is it irreducibly complex?
Up there with “It’s the ship that made the Kessel Run in less than twelve parsecs.”
Hate to say this but the commentary reminds me of the Eurovision Song Contest …..
Only without Terry Wogan.
Was that the one that discovered ABBA?
Yes, hence why Waterloo is on the map above.
Listening to BBC radio early this morning, some one sent a text in to the programme to wonder what all the fuss is about. “it’s just a useless lump of rock – what’s the big deal?” or words to that effect.
Well, at least they are listening to the BBC and not KROCK 99.9….or something to that effect.
Once again, western science is struggling to keep up with that which has already been foretold in the holy texts, Allahu Akbar!!
Isn’t it marvelous that God put that comet right where it needed to be at the exact time in human history when we have the technology to go to it!!11!!
/fundiethink
Yes, it seems that science, which doesn’t know everything, only allows us to fling a rocket off in some random direction and THE LORD! will obligingly put a comet in front of it.
Truly, it is like magic.
Except for actually being science.
I know! Especially given the prolonged flight time, and the very complex flyby and braking maneuvers that were needed to get the thing in synchronized orbit around this irregularly shaped body.
The ESA should be very, very proud. Well done.
Holy parewhatever Batman! That thing looks just like one of those British lion things you see in London.
Yes, it does have a certain felid appearance. Cats are Gods.
Readers might be interested to know that Mary Doria Russell wrote two science fiction books – The Sparrow & Children of God – about space travelers hooking up on a comet to sling themselves into deep space. Both have an anthropological/evolutionary bent and I think The Sparrow won a book award for science fiction writing. So, this is a case of science imitating art.
The picture of Philae as seen from the Rosetta probe, shown at the ESA website, is just awesome …
About 15 minutes to go now for confirmation of what Philae is up to.
YIPPY KI YAY 67p!
DOWN !!!
That’s what it looks like; everyone is celebrating, hugging, and handshaking in the control room.
There is an uncomfortable pause now whilst they confirm….
They updated their Twitter feed saying it landed and they received signals from the comet surface.
And confirmed !!! Well done !
Confirmed!
Rosetta is now sitting on the surface of the comet.
Science FTW!
CONFIRMED! An amazing feat!
I cannot recognize the part of America all these people are from…
Yesssssss….
SCIENCE, bitches!
/pinkman
🙂 I thought that rock looked kind-of blue! (oh happy day!)
ha ha!
Amazing!
Sometimes good things can happen when the humans work together.
All this “the size of part of London” stuff is very confusing. Just tell us how many times the size of Wales it is, that’s what we understand.
I hear ya.
I don’t know anything about the geographic size of London. But if you were to tell me that the European Space Agency landed a probe on a comet that is hundreds of thousands of times the mass of Charles Barkley, that I’d understand.
I find various sources talk about the size of the lander is the size of a “washing machine” while others say the size of a “refrigerator”. If I was writing about it, I’d come up with something else just to be original: “the size of a couple love seats strapped together not end to end but next to each other and not the really poofy love seats but the kind of love seats that are rather low key by today’s design standards.”
This is why I can’t be a journalist. 🙂
I want to know if that is a standard depth refrigerator or a cabinet depth unit. Also… are we talking about 19 cubic feet? 22? 25? Is there an in-door ice dispenser?
I thought the same. And the washer – is it front load or top load?
Also, could one survive an atomic explosion if inside the lander?
“It’s just like the Lowkea Love-seat – now available at your local Ikea.”
See – they could do a whole promotional tie in thing.
This article sponsored by IKEA.
and thanks for the coffee blown out of my nose.
i want to see a whole article written like that!
Ha ha! Smilies upon smilies so that the topic in the article is totally lost.
You’re not missing anything, unless you like terrible hours and low pay.
Just as long as they stick to sports metaphors and sports comparisons. As a USAian, I can only understand things in those terms.
Or if from Texas…comparisons can only be made to Texas or things Texans know and care about it.
So, we should describe the comet as shaped like two armadillos caught in flagrante delicti?
Ambition! Well done ESA!
Well done, people who worked on this!
Outstanding! Oh and yeah, the New Horizons mission is only some eight months travel time away from Pluto and its satellites. Next summer will be just fine.
Exciting times for science and Homo sapiens.
Great commentary from Jean-Jacques Dardain(sp?; with round hornrim glasses) in the live feed starting around 3:06, that this is the result of “terrestrial intelligence… hard work… dedication… and not from the sky.”
Seems that there is a problem:
Seems that the probes didn’t fire properly. They are, according to the Beeb, attempting a “re-fire”
I [rude words] hate using pyrotechnics. They’re a bit … irrevocable.
From CNN: “Shortly after landing was confirmed, the probe tweeted: “Touchdown! My new address: 67P!” Later, it tweeted again: “I’m on the surface but my harpoons did not fire.””
If I understand correctly, the lander is not anchored to the surface.
The Google banner acknowledges the mission! This means it is really famous!
Ironically a lot has changed in the 10 years of Rosetta’s journey. Emergence of life do not rely on delivered organics or water anymore, most of it likely were present already during planetesimal aggregation. I hope Philae can confirm the hydrogen and nitrogen isotope measurements that tell us that. [“Early accreation of water in the inner solar system from a carbonaceous chondrite-like source”, Sarafian et al, Science, 2014]
That article was just published (31/10), and I don’t know about its reception. But already before that, the D/H ratio of comets isn’t really consistent with such delivery. _Some_ comets happen to overlap with Earth, which is why Sarafian’s paper used nitrogen isotope ratios to differentiate them from early inner disk material. Turns out the later has precisely the right volatiles, and long before comets are believed to contribute. At most 40 % of water should then have came from comets.
And just a few weeks ago, another paper hints at that about half the protoplanetary disk water derived directly from the molecular cloud our system formed from. If that is correct it pulls down the likely comet contribution to at most a few percent.
If water were present already after a few million years and delivered with some of the planetesimals that made the planets, it would be consistent with the early “cold, wet Earth” that zircon data tells us about. That increases the chances for habitable planets.
And then life could have emerged already ~ 4.4 billion years ago. That speed increases the chance for life emergence on those habitable planets.