The Philae, which is a fridge size space probe that will be used to study the comet in various ways, landed on comet 67P after its launch from the Rosetta Stone Space ship. The comet is currently 310 million miles (that's approximately 744 million km) away from Earth. This glorious moment in human aerospace history has been over 15 years in the making, spending over 2 billion dollars!
The Rosetta, which carried the Philae probe took off from Earth 10 years ago and scientists have been waiting all this time for the perfect moment, the perfect comet to launch the Philae and land. There have obviously been problems along the way, but space engineers, astronomers, and astrophysicists (to name a few of careers for you) have worked tirelessly to figure out solutions.
The 67P comet orbits using Jupiters gravitational field and happened to be at the perfect location, with a speed (of a whopping 50,000km per hour!) and orbiting angle that would increase the slim chances of the Philae's landing. Believe it or not, it was a harpoon like device that enabled the Philae to attach to the comet. Ironically an ancient weapon used for hunting has enabled us to achieve this great feat in human history.
The scientists interest in studying comets stems from the believe that possibly comets may have been the key to life here on Earth. They hope to use the transmitted data from the Philae to find out if in fact it was a collision of comets on or near Earth that brought water and the necessary elements for life's creation.
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The Rosetta, which carried the Philae probe took off from Earth 10 years ago and scientists have been waiting all this time for the perfect moment, the perfect comet to launch the Philae and land. There have obviously been problems along the way, but space engineers, astronomers, and astrophysicists (to name a few of careers for you) have worked tirelessly to figure out solutions.
The 67P comet orbits using Jupiters gravitational field and happened to be at the perfect location, with a speed (of a whopping 50,000km per hour!) and orbiting angle that would increase the slim chances of the Philae's landing. Believe it or not, it was a harpoon like device that enabled the Philae to attach to the comet. Ironically an ancient weapon used for hunting has enabled us to achieve this great feat in human history.
The scientists interest in studying comets stems from the believe that possibly comets may have been the key to life here on Earth. They hope to use the transmitted data from the Philae to find out if in fact it was a collision of comets on or near Earth that brought water and the necessary elements for life's creation.
See more from the following websites: