Known as Agilkia, the landing site is named after an island in the river Nile in southern Egypt, and is located on the head of the duck-shaped comet. Astronomers are excited for Philae to reach the surface and drill into the comet, which is 311 million miles (500 million kilometers) from Earth and is thought to hold material left over from the origin of the solar system, some 4.5 billion years ago. Countdown is only hours away as a probe prepares for a daring landing on a high-speed comet. The Rosetta spacecraft has been orbiting the comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko since August, and will make history when it drops its washing-machine-size lander, Philae, onto the comet at 10:35 a.m. EST (15:35 GMT) on November 12. This will be the first time a mission tries to soft-land on a comet, allowing it to deploy delicate scientific instruments, and will mark only the eighth body in the solar system to be landed on. (See the National Geographic Channels Comet Catcher: The Rosetta Landing. European Space Agency officials have described the descent and landing of Philae as their seven hours of terror, a clear reference to NASAs own risky seven minutes of terror when the Curiosity rover landed on Mars back in August 2012. (See video of Mars Rovers Seven Minutes of Terror.) Here is what we expect will unfold in those final anxious hours. Watch below for live streaming coverage of the landing from the European Space Agency. news.nationalgeographic/news/2014/11/141111-starstruck-rosetta-comet-landing-guide-astronomy-science/
Posted on: Wed, 12 Nov 2014 01:00:59 +0000
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