Rosetta!!

Astonishingly, my comments regarding priorities vis a vis the Rosetta comet landings have reached sensitive ears ! The arm of Key Publishing Forums has indeed a long reach. A Highways Agency notice has appeared on the grass verge at the entrance of a road adjacent to where I live which cosily threatens to begin road repair works on the 28th of this month !

How about that for service ? Charlie, all this will be of special interest to you because it sets at naught my claim that little that is of benefit to mankind ever seems to come from these cosmic projects. Could it be that there are ‘dark forces’ at play ?

To all the knowledgeable folk; to all the armchair astronomers and cosmologists I extend my humble apologies. Never again will I be tempted to scoff. Truly, Nature works in mysterious ways, his wonders to perform.

There are depths of our oceans that we know less about than this Comet.

The astroid belt between the orbits of the planets Mars and Jupiter, consists primarily of three categories of asteroids: carbonaceous asteroids, silicate asteroids, and metallic asteroids, Rosetta and Philae are paving the way for future mining drones to enable us to harvest them…

There are depths of our oceans that we know less about than this Comet.

Practise anywhere makes perfect.

You never usually appear 300 million miles from reality!;)

If the lander had had some prior practise on the roads near to where I live, most of which resemble the surface of the comet, the outcome might have been very different.

I haven’t watched anything on the BBC but info reported direct from Philae and Rosetta confirmed it had been able to drill and send data back to HQ. Adjustment to gain additional sunlight might be attempted and the batteries might be recharged but if not the comet and its visitors will eventually be burnt up as predicted without further contact with Philae. Rosetta continues to transmit of course.

Does the fact that ESA have managed to drill into the surface mean that Philae is sitting upright on the comet?

Images from the BBC website last night showed ESA believed Philae was lying on its side but it did say that ESA had managed to rotate the top section in the hope that that would allow more light to reach the largest solar-panel. I haven’t really seen a good schematic of Philae but it would seem unlikely that the drill system would be designed to operate if the lander was lying on its side? I am also surprised that Philae has managed to drill into the surface of the comet if it is not attached to the surface in some way with its harpoons or ‘screw-feet’ given that, due to the incredibly low gravity, Philae only ‘weighs’ one gram on the surface!

News this morning was that the battery on Philae is ‘dead’; I suppose there is some hope that as the comet nears the Sun the solar-panels may gather enough charge for some final data transmission although I think the heat from the Sun will destroy Philae at some point.

And they have managed to drill and acquire data before putting Philae into hibernation. Meanwhile Rosetta continues to orbit the comet and send data. An astonishment accomplishment..

An amazing project; somehow the ‘physics’ of landing on a comet seems much more impressive than landing on the moon!

Just the photograph of the surface of a comet was worth my ‘share’ of the cost to me. Just think about it; a photograph of the surface of a comet. Not some tiny blurry whisp up in the night sky but an actual photograph of the surface of the comet that you can almost count the specks of dust!

We do indeed, John.

Not for the first time Charlie, we interpret some events very differently.

It’s already justified, John.

The impact of the landing in any respect -even allowing for gravity ? Zilch !

1.4 billion big one’s. However, I make a prediction: Some ‘good’ will come from this exercise. They have to justify their budget.

Back to the cave for you jonny, drop the machine you are using to comment on this thread on off with a responsible adult on the way! Plus any non-stick utensils, GPS navigation devices, mobile phone(s), television, any tickets for flights you have booked, oh and as you don’t want to know what the weather will be doing you get to stay sat in your cave for the remainder of your life. Do enjoy! 🙂

Absolutely!

HotRod magazine had a brief interview with a person who deals with mating metals that fight each other under normal standards.
They use the term for what is now for sound bytes called 3-D printing but the gent says that the modes they develop usually do not hit the mass market for on average ten years after it is old school for them.

Bleep and Booster?

The comet is ….. a nest of aliens. They clearly ……tipped it onto its side ……

Perhaps they tipped it over to use one of the on-board cameras to take a “selfie” that they can post on “Greenfacebook“….or whatever their alien equivalent social network is….

It’s a shame the lander ‘bounced’ into the shade and onto its side, but as others have said, what an achievement to even get it onto the surface – how many of us (or our employers) can plan ten years ahead at all, let alone at the level of detail required to achieve this sort of thing.

And to think it has all been achieved with the technology available 10-15 years ago… I can’t help but wonder what might have been achieved if Rosetta and Philae (?sp) were carrying today’s technology.

“Hats off” to all involved.

UFO watchers have revealed the truth. The comet is not a comet at all but a nest of aliens. They clearly sabotaged the landings and have tipped it onto its side rendering it ineffective within hours!! Now we know!;)

Charlie,

My imagination is working overtime, even so, what practical benefits can there be for the broad mass of mankind ?

The Apollo moon landings were a spectacular exercise in international oneupmanship. The landings to which you refer are remarkable but, that is about it !

Back to the cave for you jonny, drop the machine you are using to comment on this thread on off with a responsible adult on the way! Plus any non-stick utensils, GPS navigation devices, mobile phone(s), television, any tickets for flights you have booked, oh and as you don’t want to know what the weather will be doing you get to stay sat in your cave for the remainder of your life. Do enjoy! 🙂

Well quite!! Bargain basement price! I suppose if we had objected to our money being spent in the cause of discovering ANYTHING about ourselves and our world we’d probably still be cave squatting.

I’m sorry for appearing to ‘raining on someone’s parade’ but, who paid for this exercise and what was the amount of the budget ?

Oddly enough I was just reading this link… http://www.vox.com/xpress/2014/11/12/7209487/comet-philae-cost

1.4 billion Euros – which works out at E3.50 per person across the EU. A ticket to see Interstellar at the cinema averages E8.50… so for once I’d say Europe’s welcome to the couple of quid it’s cost me personally…