Rosetta Mission - First ever comet landing is a success!

[Tycho?]

I'm surprised I see no thread about this; if I'm blind and I've missed the huge thread, sorry.

The lander is supposed to touch down 11.00EST.

Livestream: http://new.livestream.com/ESA/cometlanding

Live comic: http://xkcd.com/1446/
scroll back frames in live comic here: http://xkcd1446.org/

Details:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rosetta_(spacecraft)

It is trying to land on this:


Discuss!

Marauder

It will be impressive if they pull it off without the lander suffering any damage. I would like to see more focus on landing on asteroids and comets, which hold water, gas and rare metals, than fairly low-return expeditions like Mars.

Putting humans on Mars is not going to net us much. Putting robots on rocks that we can mine and make profitable expeditions to will lead to more advancement in the long run. It gives a tangible incentive to expeditions, much like the early days of colonization. Columbus didn't set out for India because he wanted to take a selfie. He was financially motivated....and as altruistic as many space agencies try to be, the only plausible way we get to a space based civilization is to follow similar motives. You will never convince the dumb humans in our civilization that this ball of rock cant support us human parasites for much longer and we need to look elsewhere without promising them some glorious space cheddar.

[Tycho?]

I largely agree, but it will be privately funded missions that go looking for profit. I'm not a big fan of the profit motive and what it does to people (namely the inevitable conflict and inequity that goes along with), but I do think space travel will really get going for resource extraction rather than pure science.

However it goes, this is one of those first steps. I hope the little guy makes it.

[Tycho?]

Less than 10 minutes to touch down, and another 28 minutes after that before the signal can reach us here on Earth to know whether or not it worked.

quovadis13

Damn space being so big that we still have to wait half an hour to find out about something that just happened.

[Tycho?]

ESA mission control look worried as all hell. Expecting the signal of success or failure in 15 mins or so.

[Tycho?]

quovadis13

Landed!

[Tycho?]

Mission control is celebrating! Not sure exactly what though....

quovadis13

They are on the comet and getting data!

Humans rock!!

Elvenshae

WE ARE ON A FUCKING COMET

Elvenshae

LIKE HOLY SHIT

syndalis

THEY DID IT!

Marauder

Cue obligatory "We got there first bitches!" from the Europeans. They certainly are entitled to it though, very impressive feat considering relative speeds and harpooning into a surface of unknown composition.

Hakkekage

OMG!

Hakkekage

Hope the first report is: comet is made of SPICE

davidsdurions

Hakkekage wrote: »

Hope the first report is: comet is made of SPICE

Took the words right out of my mouth!

SyphonBlue

Lot of people making Armageddon jokes.

That was an asteroid, idiots.

see317

So, do we need to change the thread title? Maybe remove the word "if"?

honovere

SyphonBlue wrote: »

Lot of people making Armageddon jokes.

That was an asteroid, idiots.

but didn't it outgas like a comet?

quovadis13

The first images TAKEN FROM THE SURFACE OF A COMET were apparently just taken and should arrive back to earth shortly

RMS Oceanic

This feels pretty wonderful.

Joolander

Successfully harpooning a comet?

http://youtu.be/60BjkUtqxPE

Close enough

Surfpossum

Who the heck is the (British?) guy who spoke before the NASA guy and gave us, "Hollywood is good, but Rosetta is better."

Edit: I should have respected the speed of the internet, apparently he was one Dr. David Parker?

quovadis13

Hmmm, they detected that the dampers moved which indicates that it hit the surface, but the anchors haven't deployed apparently. So Philae might not technically be secured to the comet yet.

Elvenshae

Ahah - hence the XKCD update to say, "Do harpoons work on comets: Don't know!"

Skunty

That's going to seem like an awful lot of clapping and back slapping if it's not secured.

L Ron Howard

This is awesome!!

[Tycho?]

Skunty wrote: »

That's going to seem like an awful lot of clapping and back slapping if it's not secured.

Well, they have an intact lander on the surface of the comet, sending back data. Just getting this far is enormously difficult, especially for such an irregular surface. Even if they can only conduct experiments for a short time it is still a success.

wilting

Was glued to this at work. Had a stupid grin on my face walking home after.

Anarchy Rules!

The Guardian is reporting that whilst the harpoons may not have worked, the robot's screws have apparently dug into the comet

davidsdurions

I want to mention this project launched 2 March 2004.

With multiple side missions of flybys of objects including taking pictures that have been pretty rad along the way.

This shit is cool.

Marauder

Yeah, they were initially saying the harpoons fired and reeled in, but now saying they didn't fire at all. My first thought was that they hit a dust patch and the harpoon didn't snare anything to anchor to...hopefully it was a misfire and they will be able to shoot properly and/or again.

That being said, being able to place a lander on an irregularly shaped surface of unsure composition (could be ice, could be dust, could be a rocky substrate...who knows?) on an object with zero gravity that it hurtling through space at thousands of km per hour is a pretty impressive feat.

Think of how much planning and approach goes into docking with the ISS, something that it is in a stable orbit, at a known speed, no rotation or spin, and your docking craft has a ton of maneuverability and thruster capability.

Philae has limited thrust, has to come in at just the right speed to not crush the lander on the surface but not so slow as to float away from it or get off target because of the objects movement.

The fact they didn't smash the lander on impact is pretty impressive...thats what I had my fail money on. Think about jumping off a building and not knowing whether you have feathers below you or concrete painted to look like feathers. And no way to know for certain till you jump.

Skunty

Marauder wrote: »

The fact they didn't smash the lander on impact is pretty impressive...thats what I had my fail money on. Think about jumping off a building and not knowing whether you have feathers below you or concrete painted to look like feathers. And no way to know for certain till you jump land.

Optimism lasts until the moment of impact.

[Tycho?]

Philae's top mounted thruster failed too. So there was nothing pushing it down to the comet, only the minute gravity.

[Tycho?]

Screen grab, during the landing:

PantsB

https://twitter.com/dcas1978/status/532574794722836480

Morran

Seriously, is the best, fasted updated source of Rosetta-related news a webcomic?

Morran

Man, xkcd is awesome!

Hakkekage

speaking for humanity here--yes, this is completely appropriate and fitting given my universal knowledge and Earth-sized ego--looks like we legit did it

confirmed

rejoice, citizens of human space

[Tycho?]

Morran wrote: »

Seriously, is the best, fasted updated source of Rosetta-related news a webcomic?

I had open in tabs a live stream, a space-nerd forum thread, BBC stream, and the comic.

When I really wanted to know something, I went to the comic. Yes xkcd is amazing.

Better version of the above:


Just before landing. It looks like they chose a good landing site after all, it appears fairly regular and flat. But you could imagine how one of the legs hitting that outcropping in the top right could cause problems. Very nice work getting this thing landed.