** we may now never hear from the Philae lander again. ** It turned out the harpoons Philae was meant to fire to secure itself to the surface failed, and the low gravity on the comet saw the lander bounce 1km back up into space. **Philae returned to the surface (it could just have easily floated off into deep space), but unfortunately landed in a mostly shaded area. ** As of today, Philae has gone into idle mode. ** All of its systems have shut down and the batteries are empty. ** The next possible chance of communication is November 15. ** The good news is we’ve got a lot of data from Philae’s short life and Rosetta will continue to orbit Comet 67P as it heads towards the sun. ** Fingers crossed this isn’t the last we hear from Philae.
Posted on: Sat, 15 Nov 2014 20:27:38 +0000