Fascinating. For those who dont know, the Rosetta lander - Philae - bounced. Twice. (i.e., three touchdowns... Pilots out there will recognize that Philae simply executed a couple touch-and-gos. Typical for a first solo flight.) Since the reverse thruster (and harpoons) didnt work, when Philae hit the surface it rebounded at about 38 cm/s. Philaes first bounce was almost 1 km high and lasted almost 2 hours. A heck of a bounce, but thats what low gravity gets you. In the time of that first bounce, the comet would have rotated about 53 deg underneath before Philae landed again. However, the best guess shows that the final landing spot wasnt that far away; the red box in the attached photo shows the initial touchdown spot, and the blue diamond is the suspected final location, which still is on the head. The second bounce was much smaller, about 3 cm/s for only about 7 minutes. Philaes orientation apparently is with two of the three legs on the ground, one sticking up. Illumination isnt great, which will have an impact on the battery charging. The lander seems to be relatively healthy (all things considered) and many of the instruments have obtained initial data, including the CONSERT instrument that is doing radio sounding through the comet that will measure the comets internal structure and also help locate the lander. They are taking things slow, and wont activate the sample drill and the MUPUS deployment until they figure out a little more about safety.
Posted on: Thu, 13 Nov 2014 20:19:02 +0000
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