ESA’s ‘Rosetta’ discovered and photographed the “fallen asleep” module “Phil” – RIA Novosti

MOSCOW, September 5 – RIA Novosti . The probe “Rosetta” was finally able to find the descent module “Phil” and get it the first images after landing on the comet Churyumov-Gerasimenko in less than a month before the end of the mission, spending on these searches almost two years, according to the European Space Agency.

“This discovery has come to us at the end of an extremely long and laborious searches. we have even begun to think that” Phil “will remain forever lost to us. It is wonderful that we have these pictures literally in the last hours of life,” Rosetta ” – said Patrick Martin (Patrick Martin), head of mission at ESA

“Phil” close-up

The probe “Rosetta” was launched in August 2004 and for the ten years covered the distance in the 6.4 billion kilometers separating the comet Churyumov-Gerasimenko from our planet. In September last year, ESA experts finally decided on the primary and backup landing points of the descent module “Phil”, delivered to the comet “Rosetta”. The evening of 12 November, he successfully landed on the comet made two “jump” on the surface.

Because of the gas engine failure and problems with the launch of ruk- “harpoons”, “Phil” landed at an unknown location, and I got into a dark crevice in the comet’s surface, which drastically reduced the timing of its work. On the second day after the landing of ESA engineers have decided to transfer the unit to sleep mode in the hope to awaken it in the future.

In June 2015 “Phil” suddenly made contact with “Rosetta”, but within a few weeks, the connection was lost again, and ESA experts have spent the last 6 months in an attempt to restore it. Attempts to re-establish contact were discontinued only in late July 2016, when the “Phil” was guaranteed to end its existence because of the sharp decline in temperature at the comet.

Worth noting that the experts of the German Aerospace Center ( DLR), worked with “Filoy”, were forced to conduct all of their “rescue” almost blindly, as the landing place “Fila” because of his jumping on the comet, was unknown to scientists and engineers, despite all attempts to locate him.

Only the second September OSIRIS camera managed to get photos of the region of Abydos, where he was hiding “Phil”, and to consider how and where a lost fell descent module. These pictures, as they say, scientists have been obtained at a distance of only 2.7 kilometers from the surface of the comet Churyumov-Gerasimenko, which dropped “Rosetta” in the last phase of his mission.

As said Matt Taylor, discovery, despite the fact that “Phil” is no longer wake up, it is very important for scientists, because now they know on what side is the probe and how to interpret the data collected them after landing on the comet Churyumov-Gerasimenko.

Less than a month later, on September 30 this year, “Rosetta” will begin its descent to the surface of a comet, during which she will receive a unique high-quality pictures of its surface in Maat region geology is most interested scientists. After the probe touches the surface, it will shut down and forever will be a resident of the comet on a par with “Filoy”.