‘Rosetta’ lands on comet, ends mission
DARMSTADT: Europe’s pioneering Rosetta spacecraft concluded a 12-year odyssey with a controlled crash-landing yesterday onto the comet it has orbited and probed for two years to unravel the secrets of the Solar System’s birth, mission controllers said.
“I can confirm the full success of the descent of Rosetta,” Mission Manager Patrick Martin announced to wild cheering in the control centre, based in Darmstadt near Frankfurt in Western Germany.
“Rock-n-roll Rosetta,” added a visibly moved Matt Taylor, the mission’s project scientist, as he stepped from the podium, holding — and shaking — his head.
In the hours before the crash-landing, Rosetta gathered crucial last-gasp data from nearer the galactic wanderer than ever before, its instruments primed to sniff the comet’s gassy halo, measure temperature and gravity, and take close-up pictures of the spot that is now its icy tomb.
The craft had been programmed for a “controlled impact”, at a human walking pace of about 90cm per second, after a 14-hour freefall from an altitude of 19km.
Confirmation of the mission’s end came at 11.19 GMT (6.19pm Thai time), when the spacecraft’s signal — with a 40-minute delay — faded from ground controllers’ computer screens. The trailblazing craft’s final manoeuvre was executed at a distance of 720 million kilometres from Earth, with the comet zipping through space at a speed of over 14km per second.
Mission scientists expected it would bounce and tumble about before settling — but Rosetta’s exact fate will never be known as it was instructed to switch off on first impact.
The comet chaser was never designed to land. The first-ever mission to orbit and land on a comet was approved in 1993 to explore the birth of our Solar System 4.6 billion years ago.
Rosetta and lander probe Philae travelled more than 6 billion kilometres over 10 years to reach 67P in August 2014. Philae was released onto the comet surface in November of that year, gathering 60 hours of on-site data.
Having made the closest approach on its 6.6-year loop around the Sun in August last year, the comet is now moving further away from our planetary system’s central star, which means Rosetta’s solar panels are catching fewer rays of energy.
Scientists opted to end the mission on a high by taking measurements from up close — too close to risk under usual operating conditions.