Could This Be The ESA’s Missing Comet Lander?

After months of searching , the European Space Agency suppose it may have finally enamor a glimpse of the lack Philae Lander on the Earth’s surface of Comet 67P / Churyumov - Gerasimenko .

Duringits historical lineage back in November 2014 , the lander ’s harpoons failed to right deploy and its ice screws were not enough to batten it at its intended landing site , an area known as Agilkia . Aftera tremendous bounce that resulted in an extra two - hr flight , the lander lastly came to rest in an orbit telephone Abydos . The investigation managed to crack its nowiconic final image , but soon expired due to its unfitness to draw any energy from the sun .

In the weeks and month following , the ESA ’s OSIRIS team been tirelessly searching for the lander by analyzing images and performing simulations to determine where it might be . After ruling out four out of five possible landing site , the ESA now tell it may have at long last located the missing lander , though it can not be confirmed .

A key portion to the potential find was in narrowing down the lander ’s terminal location . The ESA scientists did this as part of the CONSERT experimentation presently after touchdown . By analyzing radio signaling sent between the lander and Rosetta ( its mother spacecraft ) they were able to base the landing site to within an ellipse approximately 52 x 525 feet ( 16 x 160 meters ) in size , just outside the rim of the Hatmehit Great Depression .

“ We have place several possible lander campaigner in OSIRIS images , both inside the CONSERT region of interest and nearby , ” note Holger Sierks , OSIRIS master researcher at the Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research ( MPS ) in Germany , in astatement .

Four of the five spots are well away from the oval , but two image in particular grabbed the care of the OSIRIS team . pic charm on December 12 and 13 from a distance of 12.4 miles ( 20 kilometer ) appears to show something just a few meters outside the CONSERT ellipse .

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significantly , the object were not view in persona taken two month prior . The ESA articulate that most of the spots are potential Earth’s surface feature article of the comet , but one of them could very well be the lander .

“ Although the pre- and post - landing images were take at different spatial resolutions , local topographic detail fit well , except for one hopeful spot present on post - landing images , which we advise is a good candidate for the lander , ” note OSIRIS squad penis Philippe Lamy , adding : “ This bright spot is visible on two different image pack in December 2014 , intelligibly indicating that it is a real feature on the surface of the comet , not a sensor artifact or move foreground dust speck . ”

So is this the lander ? The ESA say it ’s still not solely sure :

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On one hired man , analysis carried out at the Philae Science Operations and Navigation Center ( SONC ) at CNES paint a picture that this nominee gratify a number of constraints regarding , for illustration , miniature and wireless visibility in this region .

On the other , the candidate is turn up just outside the ellipse presently identified by CONSERT , although as mentioned earlier , ameliorate figure mannikin and continued CONSERT information analytic thinking may alter its position .

Also , given the relatively foresightful seven hebdomad interval between the ‘ before ’ and ‘ after ’ images , it is possible that this object is due to a forcible change at that location on the core , perhaps as freshman material was newly expose . The relative want of significant illumination in this region at the time argues that such changes are unlikely , but they can not be completely ruled out .

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