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#851392 01/19/14 08:04 AM
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Tomorrow, January 20, ESA’s Rosetta spacecraft is due to come out of hibernation after over two and a half years. After the wake-up call a series of actions will start with the warming of her star trackers. Rosetta's needs to get oriented and on course for a mission to orbit comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko and send a lander to it.

Here is an animation from the European Space Agency (ESA) showing what should happen to wake Rosetta up.
How Rosetta wakes up

Last edited by Mona - Astronomy; 11/09/14 03:40 AM.
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Hi there Mona - why did they put Rosetta to sleep? Were they waiting for the comet to come 'into view' and in the meantime have Rosetta up there and ready for action? Fascinating how she wakes up ... Very interesting in all! Cheers


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Hi Lestie! Much jubilation - and relief - when the signal was received to show Rosetta had woken up. (Hope she's not grumpy.)

And why the hibernation? Rosetta had to get into an orbit that would let her catch comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko as it swings back in towards the Sun. This put the craft a heck of a long way from the Sun for a few years.

But Rosetta relies completely on solar energy for power - the first mission to do so when traveling so far from the Sun. Although the solar cells were of a new design, nonetheless the available sunlight was way too weak for Rosetta to operate correctly. However there was enough power to maintain the onboard computer and heaters to ensure the craft didn't just freeze up.

Last edited by Mona - Astronomy; 01/23/14 01:00 AM.
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ESA has an interactive visualization tool to show where Rosetta has been since launch, or where she is now, or a projection of where she's expected to be. You can see the distance from the Sun, from Earth and from the Comet.

On the page, click on the little "i" to find out how it works. Where is Rosetta?

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The climax of an amazing space mission is set for summer 2014. Rosetta, the European Space Agency (ESA) spacecraft, has already traveled for ten years and billions of miles in order to rendezvous with a comet, accompany it as it moves into the inner Solar System, and deploy a lander.

Rosetta the Comet Chaser

Last edited by Mona - Astronomy; 01/29/14 06:26 AM.
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Today ESA says: We asked you to help us wake up Rosetta from 31 months of deep-space hibernation in a fun video shout-out contest. With over 200 entries and 75 000 votes, you certainly succeeded! The rules were simple: take out your mobile phone and record a ‘selfie’ of you shouting “Wake up, Rosetta!” But you were far more creative than that…

ESA has made a delightful mashup of some of the fun entries.
Wake up Rosetta

Last edited by Mona - Astronomy; 02/02/14 03:29 AM.
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Rosetta has seen Comet 67P/C-G. Here is an image taken last week of Comet 67P with the OSIRIS wide-angle camera. In May the ESA team will need to carry out “a critical series of manoeuvres [to] . . . gradually reduce Rosetta's velocity relative to the comet” for its close encounter at the start of August.

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Today the Rosetta team has been carrying out the first of a series of thruster burns. By the end of July there will be another seven of these maneuvers in order to adjust Rosetta's speed with respect to the comet. Otherwise they would just pass by each other.

Last edited by Mona - Astronomy; 06/03/14 12:02 PM.
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Rosetta carried out a second course adjustment on May 21st, and will do a third tomorrow. (There will be ten altogether to get the spacecraft to meet the comet in August.) The first thruster burn was small, but the second lasted for 7 hours and 16 minutes. Tomorrow's burn will take 6 hours and 41 minutes. This is slightly less than was originally expected, but it has been adjusted downward using the latest data about the comet's orbit.




Last edited by Mona - Astronomy; 06/03/14 12:01 PM.
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Rosetta has been in space for ten years and today, July 9th, she is 20,000 kilometers from Comet 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko. That's the same distance as halfway around the Earth at the Equator, so you can see she's getting close, ready for a rendezvous on August 6.

To commemorate Rosetta's impending arrival, ESA is running a photo contest contest celebrating journeys and arrivals. The winner will be invited to ESA's operations center in Germany in November and there are ten runner-up prizes.

Here's a video explaining how to take part in the competition. (It's pretty straightforward.)

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