ESA Rosetta, news, updates and discussion Options

[paxdan]

Well Rosetta isn't going to get to 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko (Chury) till 2014, but it's not to early to set up a thread. There are a bunch of earth fly-bys, a Mars encounter at 200km in 2007 and a few asteriod passes. Not to mention the mission to land on the comet itself.

Only another nine and a half years to go.

[Guest_BruceMoomaw_*]

Good news on the problem with the sticky thermal door covering the OSIRIS cameras -- a problem which ESA had indicated in two status reports starting in January, but about which I simply could not pry any information from them. (Even Mike A'Hearn -- who is a co-investigator! -- had only been told that it was "some kind of stickiness".) ESA's close-mouthedness is a serious pain in the ass.

However, judging from the latest status report, they seem to have finally developed a software fix for it (after one unsuccessful earlier try).

http://sci.esa.int/science-e/www/object/in...fobjectid=37534 :

"On 31 May a test of the OSIRIS door mechanism was carried out with the
presence of the PI team at ESOC. The purpose of this test was to
characterise the behaviour of the flight model, compare it with the test
results on the ground models and finalise the new software routines for the
control of the door to be uplinked on 14 June. The test was successful and
the OSIRIS team has already delivered the new software. ESOC is preparing
for next week's uplink and verification operations."