Sunday Times 2
Spacecraft Rosetta catches up to comet after 10-year chase
View(s):FRANKFURT (Reuters) – European spacecraft Rosetta became the first ever to catch up with a comet, a landmark stage in a decade-long space mission that scientists hope will help unlock some of the secrets of the solar system.
A handout image of an artist's impression, of the Rosetta orbiter (REUTERS)
Rosetta, launched by the European Space Agency (ESA) in 2004, will accompany comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko on its trip around the sun and land a probe on it later this year in an unprecedented maneuver.
Scientists are now on a tight schedule to learn enough about the comet using data from Rosetta to safely land the spacecraft’s probe on it in November.
Scientists hope data the probe gathers on the surface of the comet will allow them to peek into a kind of astronomical time capsule that has preserved for millions of years clues about what the world looked like when our solar system was born.