Unmanned Exploration Of Comets & Asteroids |
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Unmanned Exploration Of Comets & Asteroids |
| Guest_PhilCo126_* |
  Jan 2 2006, 07:48 PM
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#1
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Guests  |
Trying to give an overview of missions to Asteroids & comets …
 Giotto ( 2 July 1985 to comet HALLEY in 1986 and to comet Grigg-Skjellerup in 1992 ) NEAR Shoemaeker ( 17 February 1996 to asteroid 433 Eros in February 2001 ) Deep Space 1 ( 15 October 1998 to comet BORELLY in September 2001 ) StarDust ( 07 February 1999 to comet WILD-2 in January 2004 ) Contour ( July 2002 to comet ENCKE … mission failure ) Deep Impact ( 12 January 2005 to comet TEMPLE-1 in July 2005 ) Which missions did I forget ?  … … … |
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Jan 2 2006, 08:05 PM
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#2
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Founder  Group: Chairman Posts: 14432 Joined: 8-February 04 Member No.: 1 |
'Five spacecraft were sent to examine Halley’s Comet at its return in 1985: two Japanese (Suisei and Sakigake), two Russian (Vegas 1 and 2) and one European (Giotto). Giotto was launched 2 July 1985 and actually passed through the comet’s head, within 335 miles of the velvet black nucleus, obtaining 2,112 close-range images of it, until the probe was jolted by hitting a rice-grain sized dust particle. It revealed that the nucleus was an irregular lumpy potato-shaped object, 9.3 miles in length, and had a rotation period of 53 hours, with a 7.3-day rotational period around this axis. Its temperature on the side nearest the Sun was 47°C.
http://infoman16.tripod.com/Articles/halley.htm Doug |
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Jan 2 2006, 08:23 PM
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#3
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Solar System Cartographer Group: Members Posts: 10163 Joined: 5-April 05 From: Canada Member No.: 227 |
Galileo to Gaspra and Ida, NEAR to Mathilde, DS1 to Braille, Stardust to AnneFrank.
Phil -------------------- ... because the Solar System ain't gonna map itself.
Also to be found posting similar content on https://mastodon.social/@PhilStooke Maps for download (free PD: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/comm...Cartography.pdf NOTE: everything created by me which I post on UMSF is considered to be in the public domain (NOT CC, public domain) |
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Jan 2 2006, 08:30 PM
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#4
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 Interplanetary Dumpster Diver Group: Admin Posts: 4404 Joined: 17-February 04 From: Powell, TN Member No.: 33 |
ICE to Comet Giacobini-Zinner, 1985.
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Jan 2 2006, 08:47 PM
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#5
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 Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 2488 Joined: 17-April 05 From: Glasgow, Scotland, UK Member No.: 239 |
Er... ...Hayabusa, anyone?
D'oh! Bob Shaw -------------------- Remember: Time Flies like the wind - but Fruit Flies like bananas!
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Jan 3 2006, 01:58 AM
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#6
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Solar System Cartographer Group: Members Posts: 10163 Joined: 5-April 05 From: Canada Member No.: 227 |
D'oh is right!
Could add Cassini's distant obs of Masursky as he zipped by on his way to wherever. Phil -------------------- ... because the Solar System ain't gonna map itself.
Also to be found posting similar content on https://mastodon.social/@PhilStooke Maps for download (free PD: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/comm...Cartography.pdf NOTE: everything created by me which I post on UMSF is considered to be in the public domain (NOT CC, public domain) |
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Jan 3 2006, 02:05 AM
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#7
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Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 2488 Joined: 17-April 05 From: Glasgow, Scotland, UK Member No.: 239 |
QUOTE (Phil Stooke @ Jan 3 2006, 02:58 AM) D'oh is right! Could add Cassini's distant obs of Masursky as he zipped by on his way to wherever. Phil  Phil: To be honest, 'D'oh' was pretty restrained... ...how could us folks have forgotten Hayabusa? Bob Shaw -------------------- Remember: Time Flies like the wind - but Fruit Flies like bananas!
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Jan 3 2006, 02:11 AM
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#8
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 Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 2454 Joined: 8-July 05 From: NGC 5907 Member No.: 430 |
Does the manned mission of Challenger 2 (which looked an awful lot like Skylab) to a giant planetoid named Orpheus that was then hit by a comet in the 1979 film Meteor count?
 http://www.filmsite.org/filmdisasters4.html I suppose I could also add the Orion-type craft mission from Deep Impact, but I refuse on principle to all things decent to even mention Armageddon. -------------------- "After having some business dealings with men, I am occasionally chagrined,
and feel as if I had done some wrong, and it is hard to forget the ugly circumstance. I see that such intercourse long continued would make one thoroughly prosaic, hard, and coarse. But the longest intercourse with Nature, though in her rudest moods, does not thus harden and make coarse. A hard, sensible man whom we liken to a rock is indeed much harder than a rock. From hard, coarse, insensible men with whom I have no sympathy, I go to commune with the rocks, whose hearts are comparatively soft." - Henry David Thoreau, November 15, 1853 |
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Jan 3 2006, 05:58 AM
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#9
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 Merciless Robot Group: Admin Posts: 8784 Joined: 8-December 05 From: Los Angeles Member No.: 602 |
I don't suppose you'd care to count all the missions that at least peripherally looked at Phobos & Deimos?...
-------------------- A few will take this knowledge and use this power of a dream realized as a force for change, an impetus for further discovery to make less ancient dreams real.
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Jan 3 2006, 01:16 PM
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#10
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 Member Group: Members Posts: 125 Joined: 18-July 05 Member No.: 438 |
QUOTE (PhilCo126 @ Jan 2 2006, 09:48 PM) Trying to give an overview of missions to Asteroids & comets … ... Which missions did I forget ? … … … Well, if you include serendipitous ion tail crossings, there's also Ulysses... It crossed Comet Hyakutakte's tail on May 1st, 1996 (~3.9 AU downtail of the nucleus!), and Comet McNaught-Hartley's tail on October 19th and 20th, 2000. |
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Jan 3 2006, 04:16 PM
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#11
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 Administrator Group: Admin Posts: 5172 Joined: 4-August 05 From: Pasadena, CA, USA, Earth Member No.: 454 |
Here's my list (which is currently posted on the Society's website):
International Cometary Explorer (ICE) [Formerly Known as International Sun-Earth Explorer (ISEE-3)], Comet Giacobini-Zinner flyby and distant Halley observer (NASA) Launch: August 12, 1978. Flyby: September 11, 1985 Vega 1 and Vega 2, Comet 1P/Halley flybys (Soviet Academy of Sciences) Launch: December 15 and 21, 1984. Flyby: March 6 and 9, 1986 Sakigake, Comet 1P/Halley flyby (Institute of Space and Aeronautical Science (ISAS)) Launch: January 8,1985. Flyby: March 11, 1986 Suisei, Comet 1P/Halley flyby (Institute of Space and Aeronautical Science (ISAS)) Launch: March 18, 1985. Flyby: March 8, 1986 Giotto, Comets 1P/Halley and 26P/Grigg-Skjellerup flyby (ESA) Launch: July 2, 1985. Halley flyby: March 13, 1986. Grigg-Skjellerup flyby: July 10, 1992 Galileo, Flyby of asteroids 951 Gaspra and 243 Ida; Jupiter orbiter (NASA) Launch: October 18, 1989. Gaspra flyby: October 29, 1991. Ida/Dactyl flyby: August 28, 1993. Witnessed Shoemaker-Levy crash: July 1994 Near Earth Asteroid Rendezvous (NEAR), Asteroid 433 Eros orbiter (eventually used as a lander!) (NASA) Launch: February 17, 1996. Eros arrival: February 14, 2000. Eros landing: February 12, 2001 Deep Space 1, Flybys of asteroid 9969 Braille and comet 19P/Borrelly (NASA) Launch: October 24, 1998. Braille flyby: July 28, 1999. Borrelly flyby: September 22, 2001 Stardust, Flyby and coma sample return from comet P/Wild 2 Launch: February 7, 1999. Wild 2 flyby: January 2, 2004. Sample return: January 15, 2006 Comet Nucleus Tour (CONTOUR), Failed multi-comet flyby (NASA) Launch: July 3, 2002. Lost August 15, 2002 Deep Impact, Flyby and impact into comet 9P/Tempel 1 Launch: January 12, 2005. Tempel 1 impact and flyby: July 4, 2005 Hayabusa (MUSES-C), Orbiter and sample return from asteroid Itokawa (1998 SF36) (ISAS) Launch: May 9, 2003. Itokawa arrival: September 2005 Rosetta, Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko orbiter and lander (ESA) Launch: March 2, 2004. Churyumov-Gerasimenko arrival: 2014 Dawn, Planned 4 Vesta and 1 Ceres orbiter (NASA) Launch: planned for May 27, 2006 (suspended indefinitely) Looks like my list is missing NEAR at Mathilde and Cassini at Masursky (and I've got to update the Hayabusa info on the page). I'll wait for this thread to develop a bit and then get to work  Do you all think that the Ulysses comet tail encounters "count"?--Emily -------------------- My website - My Patreon - @elakdawalla on Twitter - Please support unmannedspaceflight.com by donating here.
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Jan 3 2006, 04:32 PM
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#12
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Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 2454 Joined: 8-July 05 From: NGC 5907 Member No.: 430 |
Soviet scientists considered an option to send the VEGA probes to other
celestial objects after Venus and Halley in 1986. One prime target was the near-Earth planetoid 2101 Adonis, which VEGA 2 could pass at a distance of six million kilometers (3.6 million miles). Sadly, the Soviets had to back out on the opportunity to become the first nation to fly a spacecraft past a planetoid when it was discovered that there was not enough maneuvering fuel in the probe to reach Adonis as planned. VEGA 1 and 2 were quietly shut down in early 1987. Information from: Robertson, Donald F., "Venus - A Prime Soviet Objective" (Parts 1/2), SPACEFLIGHT, Volume 34, Numbers 5/6, British Interplanetary Society (BIS), London, England, May/June 1992 Considering how relatively poor the images of Halley were from the VEGAs, I have to wonder how much could have been seen and learned if they did do that flyby of Adonis? Is there anything of interest about Adonis that might warrant a future mission to that worldlet? Besides its being an NEO? -------------------- "After having some business dealings with men, I am occasionally chagrined,
and feel as if I had done some wrong, and it is hard to forget the ugly circumstance. I see that such intercourse long continued would make one thoroughly prosaic, hard, and coarse. But the longest intercourse with Nature, though in her rudest moods, does not thus harden and make coarse. A hard, sensible man whom we liken to a rock is indeed much harder than a rock. From hard, coarse, insensible men with whom I have no sympathy, I go to commune with the rocks, whose hearts are comparatively soft." - Henry David Thoreau, November 15, 1853 |
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Jan 3 2006, 07:04 PM
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#13
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 Member Group: Members Posts: 531 Joined: 24-August 05 Member No.: 471 |
Phil, take a look at my compilation.
http://www.unmannedspaceflight.com/index.php?showtopic=1436 - All Visited Asteroids At A Glance! -------------------- - blue_scape / Nico -
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| Guest_PhilCo126_* |
 Jan 3 2006, 08:43 PM
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#14
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Guests |
Emily & Nico
Thanks for pointing those links out ! 
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Jan 5 2006, 09:42 AM
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#15
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Member Group: Members Posts: 125 Joined: 18-July 05 Member No.: 438 |
QUOTE (elakdawalla @ Jan 3 2006, 06:16 PM) Here's my list (which is currently posted on the Society's website): .... Do you all think that the Ulysses comet tail encounters "count"? --Emily Well, they clearly weren't planned encounters, and were extremely far from the respective nuclei. However, they provided valuable information about the cometary ion composition and magnetic field structure of the distant tail. Maybe they could be added as "accidental encounter" entries, separate from the main list? Geraint |
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Jan 5 2006, 10:01 AM
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#16
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Founder Group: Chairman Posts: 14432 Joined: 8-February 04 Member No.: 1 |
How about 'dedicated close encounters' and 'distant encounters of opportunity'?
Doug |
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Jan 5 2006, 02:19 PM
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#17
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Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 2454 Joined: 8-July 05 From: NGC 5907 Member No.: 430 |
Earth flew through the tail of Comet Halley in 1910. And since our planet has often been called Spaceship Earth....
-------------------- "After having some business dealings with men, I am occasionally chagrined,
and feel as if I had done some wrong, and it is hard to forget the ugly circumstance. I see that such intercourse long continued would make one thoroughly prosaic, hard, and coarse. But the longest intercourse with Nature, though in her rudest moods, does not thus harden and make coarse. A hard, sensible man whom we liken to a rock is indeed much harder than a rock. From hard, coarse, insensible men with whom I have no sympathy, I go to commune with the rocks, whose hearts are comparatively soft." - Henry David Thoreau, November 15, 1853 |
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Jan 5 2006, 07:03 PM
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#18
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Member Group: Members Posts: 688 Joined: 20-April 05 From: Sweden Member No.: 273 |
QUOTE (ljk4-1 @ Jan 5 2006, 04:19 PM) Earth flew through the tail of Comet Halley in 1910. And since our planet has often been called Spaceship Earth.... Said spaceship has had a lot of close encounters of the violent kind with asteroids and comets, the latest in 1908. tty |
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Jan 5 2006, 07:33 PM
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#19
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Founder Group: Chairman Posts: 14432 Joined: 8-February 04 Member No.: 1 |
But the earth is hardly 'unmanned'
Doug |
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Jan 5 2006, 08:19 PM
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#20
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Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 2454 Joined: 8-July 05 From: NGC 5907 Member No.: 430 |
QUOTE (djellison @ Jan 5 2006, 02:33 PM) But the earth is hardly 'unmanned' Doug That should be unpersonned.  http://www.users.bigpond.com/smartboard/pc.htm -------------------- "After having some business dealings with men, I am occasionally chagrined,
and feel as if I had done some wrong, and it is hard to forget the ugly circumstance. I see that such intercourse long continued would make one thoroughly prosaic, hard, and coarse. But the longest intercourse with Nature, though in her rudest moods, does not thus harden and make coarse. A hard, sensible man whom we liken to a rock is indeed much harder than a rock. From hard, coarse, insensible men with whom I have no sympathy, I go to commune with the rocks, whose hearts are comparatively soft." - Henry David Thoreau, November 15, 1853 |
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Feb 13 2006, 04:11 PM
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#21
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Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 2454 Joined: 8-July 05 From: NGC 5907 Member No.: 430 |
Five years ago on February 12, 2001, the NEAR-Shoemaker probe became
not only the first one to orbit a planetoid (Eros), it also landed on the big ol' rock: http://near.jhuapl.edu/ And to think it was a Valentine's Day gift, too. -------------------- "After having some business dealings with men, I am occasionally chagrined,
and feel as if I had done some wrong, and it is hard to forget the ugly circumstance. I see that such intercourse long continued would make one thoroughly prosaic, hard, and coarse. But the longest intercourse with Nature, though in her rudest moods, does not thus harden and make coarse. A hard, sensible man whom we liken to a rock is indeed much harder than a rock. From hard, coarse, insensible men with whom I have no sympathy, I go to commune with the rocks, whose hearts are comparatively soft." - Henry David Thoreau, November 15, 1853 |
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Mar 20 2006, 09:31 PM
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#22
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Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 2454 Joined: 8-July 05 From: NGC 5907 Member No.: 430 |
Radioisotope Electric Propulsion: Enabling the Decadal Survey Science
Goals for Primitive Bodies STAIF, February 12-16, 2006 http://www.lpi.usra.edu/opag/mcnuttstaif06.pdf -------------------- "After having some business dealings with men, I am occasionally chagrined,
and feel as if I had done some wrong, and it is hard to forget the ugly circumstance. I see that such intercourse long continued would make one thoroughly prosaic, hard, and coarse. But the longest intercourse with Nature, though in her rudest moods, does not thus harden and make coarse. A hard, sensible man whom we liken to a rock is indeed much harder than a rock. From hard, coarse, insensible men with whom I have no sympathy, I go to commune with the rocks, whose hearts are comparatively soft." - Henry David Thoreau, November 15, 1853 |
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Oct 20 2014, 11:40 PM
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#23
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 Member Group: Members Posts: 796 Joined: 27-February 08 From: Heart of Europe Member No.: 4057 |
I cannot found better topic than this one so I apologize for reanimation of this old topic.
Here is my collage of all cometary nuclei imaged by spacecrafts and planetary radars at 25 m/pix. Now it's with C/2013 A1 Siding Spring. 
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Oct 21 2014, 12:25 AM
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#24
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 Member Group: Members Posts: 399 Joined: 28-August 07 From: San Francisco Member No.: 3511 |
machi, by your topic re-ignition you help to keep this wonderful resource that is UMSF concise.. yet.. wonderfully detailed...
Thanks for posting... -------------------- 'She drove until the wheels fell off...'
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Feb 2 2016, 09:55 PM
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#25
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 Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 2086 Joined: 13-February 10 From: Ontario Member No.: 5221 |
https://www.nasa.gov/press-release/nasa-spa...ites-into-space
NEA Scout has been approved to piggyback on SLS, along with 12(!) other cubesats, four for the Moon, the rest for deep space, and three others from international partners, yet to be announced. The target is 1991 VG, which might actually be an artificial object from the 60s or 70s... |
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Nov 16 2016, 07:50 AM
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#26
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Member Group: Members Posts: 239 Joined: 28-October 12 Member No.: 6732 |
Day of decision is coming! "During ESA’s ministerial conference in Luzern, December 1-2, 2016, the decision will be made whether or not to fund the Asteroid Impact Mission (AIM), a collaborative effort with the international AIDA mission. To reinforce the importance of the AIM mission within the scientific and space communities, asteroid experts Patrick Michel, Alan Fitzsimmons and Debbie Lewis drafted a letter in support of AIM [...] published here for the public to sign."
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Dec 3 2016, 03:36 PM
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#27
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Member Group: Members Posts: 239 Joined: 28-October 12 Member No.: 6732 |
"Insiders say [AIM] missed their target sum by perhaps a few tens of millions. “A cool project has been killed because of a lack of vision, even short term, and courage, and this is really sad,” says Patrick Michel, a planetary scientist at the French National Centre for Scientific Research in Nice, who leads AIM. ..." [nature.com]
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Dec 3 2016, 04:04 PM
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#28
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Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 2086 Joined: 13-February 10 From: Ontario Member No.: 5221 |
Darn, so close! Hopefully the DART component will be approved in March. Even a clone of the Deep Impact mission is better than nothing....
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Dec 13 2016, 08:48 AM
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#29
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 Member Group: Members Posts: 423 Joined: 13-November 14 From: Norway Member No.: 7310 |
Wörner said a few days ago (9 Dec) that he is trying to rescue the AIM mission, though how realistic that is, I have no idea.
QUOTE Woerner, on the lack of funding for the Asteroid Impact Mission: I don’t give up. I keep fighting for it because it is too important. QUOTE Woerner on AIM: ran into problems when Germany offered less than expected, then withdrew funding altogether. Still working to “rescue” it. https://twitter.com/jeff_foust/status/807274575658618880 https://twitter.com/jeff_foust/status/807278269011738624 -------------------- |
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Dec 13 2016, 05:42 PM
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#30
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 Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 1729 Joined: 3-August 06 From: 43° 35' 53" N 1° 26' 35" E Member No.: 1004 |
there was an article about AIM in this week's "the Space Review"
AIM misses the funding target, for now |
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Jul 2 2017, 06:59 AM
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#31
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Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 2086 Joined: 13-February 10 From: Ontario Member No.: 5221 |
Looks like DART is still going ahead (preliminary design phase now): https://www.nasa.gov/feature/nasa-s-first-a...xt-design-phase
I've seen no news on AIM though; no getting our hopes up? |
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Jul 2 2017, 08:10 AM
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#32
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Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 1729 Joined: 3-August 06 From: 43° 35' 53" N 1° 26' 35" E Member No.: 1004 |
last I heard, ESA was studying an AIMlight mission, costing no more than 150 million euros
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Jul 2 2017, 01:58 PM
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#33
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Member Group: Members Posts: 239 Joined: 28-October 12 Member No.: 6732 |
QUOTE (Explorer1 @ Jul 2 2017, 06:59 AM) I've seen no news on AIM though; no getting our hopes up? "La sonde AIM ne pourra pas ętre lancée en 2020 comme prévu, a reconnu l'ESA qui réfléchit ŕ envoyer une caméra qui volerait sur DART et se détacherait peu avant l'impact." It seems AIM is more or less dead, no launch in 2020. Instead, ESA is considering launching a detachable camera on DART. |
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Dec 4 2017, 04:44 PM
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#34
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Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 1729 Joined: 3-August 06 From: 43° 35' 53" N 1° 26' 35" E Member No.: 1004 |
main-belt asteroids resolved by the VLT telescope. jaw-dropping!
https://www.eso.org/public/images/potw1749a/ |
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Dec 4 2017, 06:16 PM
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#35
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Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 2086 Joined: 13-February 10 From: Ontario Member No.: 5221 |
QUOTE (Paolo @ Dec 4 2017, 11:44 AM) main-belt asteroids resolved by the VLT telescope. jaw-dropping! https://www.eso.org/public/images/potw1749a/ Wow! Probably the best views of Pallas we'll get for a while! Reminds me of the Dawn approach imagery (is that bright spot real?) |
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Feb 22 2018, 06:51 PM
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#36
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Member Group: Members Posts: 239 Joined: 28-October 12 Member No.: 6732 |
AIM is now called Hera.
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Feb 23 2018, 02:39 AM
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#37
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Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 2086 Joined: 13-February 10 From: Ontario Member No.: 5221 |
A very detailed summary, but note a slight error in the size of Didymos: 780 metres, not kilometres!
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Jun 29 2018, 01:28 PM
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#38
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Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 2086 Joined: 13-February 10 From: Ontario Member No.: 5221 |
New animation of the current mission plan for Hera: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uIKpSKZ5HAs
Overall similar to AIM except obviously arrival is along after the DART impact. Pity the original plan for dual operations fell through! |
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Jan 7 2019, 02:56 PM
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#39
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Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 2086 Joined: 13-February 10 From: Ontario Member No.: 5221 |
More info on the renamed HERA mission from ESA (includes two proposed cubesats!): http://www.esa.int/Our_Activities/Space_En...asteroid_system
Final decision on development at the end of 2019. |
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Feb 18 2019, 02:17 AM
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#40
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 Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 1637 Joined: 5-March 05 From: Boulder, CO Member No.: 184 |
More on the DART mission is on this NASA page - launch should be in about 2 years: https://www.nasa.gov/planetarydefense/dart,
and on this APL page with an upcoming April 2019 planning meeting: http://dart.jhuapl.edu/ -------------------- Steve [ my home page and planetary maps page ]
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Feb 24 2019, 11:50 AM
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#41
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Member Group: Members Posts: 125 Joined: 18-July 05 Member No.: 438 |
Comet Interceptor is a mission proposal on a shortlist of six for ESA's F-class mission call. The mission would target a dynamically new comet from the Oort Cloud, or an interstellar object. ESA is expected to select the F-class mission in July 2019. Launch would be with ESA's Ariel exoplanet observatory in 2028.
Comet Interceptor would wait at Sun-Earth L2 until a suitable target is found inbound by survey observatories such as LSST. The primary spacecraft would deploy subspacecraft for the comet encounter, providing multi-point in situ measurements of the environment near the comet, as well as different remote sensing viewpoints of the nucleus and coma. The mission's website is here, where the team are inviting registration of support for the proposal: http://www.cometinterceptor.space/ The Twitter handle is @cometintercept |
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Feb 26 2019, 06:14 AM
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#42
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Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 1729 Joined: 3-August 06 From: 43° 35' 53" N 1° 26' 35" E Member No.: 1004 |
some amazing high-resolution images of (7) Iris taken by the VLT in this paper:
The shape of (7) Iris as evidence of an ancient large impact? |
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Oct 3 2019, 11:16 AM
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#43
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Member Group: Members Posts: 529 Joined: 19-February 05 Member No.: 173 |
From Space.com a new mission possibility: Centaurs Rising: NASA Eyes Missions to Weird Asteroid-Comet Hybrids: https://www.space.com/nasa-centaur-missions...us-chimera.html |
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Oct 6 2019, 08:41 PM
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#44
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Member Group: Members Posts: 529 Joined: 19-February 05 Member No.: 173 |
29P Fragments..... http://www.astronomerstelegram.org/?read=13164 |
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Nov 28 2019, 07:26 PM
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#45
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Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 2086 Joined: 13-February 10 From: Ontario Member No.: 5221 |
Hera has been chosen at the most recent ESA budget meeting. There is also a call out for amateur astronomer to start characterizing possible flyby candidates:
http://www.esa.int/Safety_Security/Hera/Am...flybys_for_Hera |
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Feb 25 2021, 09:15 AM
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#46
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Member Group: Members Posts: 239 Joined: 28-October 12 Member No.: 6732 |
Hera's camera has been changed from flight spares of Dawn's Framing Camera to a camera without a filter wheel from the company Jena-Optronik. The motivation for this decision is "unknown", well at least to me!
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Jun 20 2021, 04:51 PM
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#47
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 Member Group: Members Posts: 444 Joined: 1-July 05 From: New York City Member No.: 424 |
It seems as though mega-comet 2014 UN271 will be the subject of sustained study and lively discussion, even if it never becomes the object of a mission. In light of Rule 2.8 I’m parking this post here with the request that the mods consider moving it to its own thread.
QUOTE T. Marshall Eubanks @TM_Eubanks Interesting discovery: 2014 UN271- a 100 km object from DECam. Perihelion 2031 Jan 28 a = 5416.99752 +/- 228 AU e = 0.9979808 +/- 8.56e-5 Incl. 95.53003 +/- 0.00023 Period = 398692 years! H = 7.8 q = 10.9377353 +/- 0.000814 AU Q = 10823.0573 +/- 459 AU https://twitter.com/TM_Eubanks/status/1406122217142984704 QUOTE Jason Wright @Astro_Wright No biggie, just a barely-bound dwarf planet coming within 11 au of the sun over the next 10 years… The next decade of planetary science discoveries is going to be WILD! https://twitter.com/Astro_Wright/status/1406327094863446017 QUOTE Emily Lakdawalla @elakdawalla Oh my gosh, how fast can we build and launch something to rendezvous with this mega-comet? Size suggests probably not technically a dwarf planet but it’s a big ‘un. (About Epimetheus size.) 11 AU is near Saturn distance so still cold enough to be quite pristine. https://twitter.com/elakdawalla/status/1406584665859772417 |
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Jun 20 2021, 05:15 PM
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#48
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Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 2086 Joined: 13-February 10 From: Ontario Member No.: 5221 |
A very nice find.
With such a high inclination, I don't think it's really within even ESA's Comet Interceptor capabilities? The perihelion is far out of the plane of the solar system (and 11 AU is quite far for a SEP mission). Perhaps the ascending and descending nodes? |
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Jun 20 2021, 11:51 PM
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#49
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Member Group: Members Posts: 204 Joined: 14-April 06 From: Seattle, WA Member No.: 745 |
According to the JPL Small-Body Database Browser period of this object is more than 612,000 years and the aphelion (Q) is more than 14,411 A.U. That is almost a quarter of a light-year.
This is based on the latest observation in 2018 and there is no computation of uncertainty, so the specifics are likely to change. But clearly this thing is coming from way out there. |
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Jun 21 2021, 03:20 PM
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#50
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 Senior Member Group: Moderator Posts: 3233 Joined: 11-February 04 From: Tucson, AZ Member No.: 23 |
Yeah, this comet is way outside the area Comet Intercepter can target. CI requires the comet to reach a heliocentric distance of 0.8 to 1.2 AU and the encounter has to take place near the ecliptic.
I wouldn't be surprised if we'll start seeing some observations come in over the next week or so now that it's announced. If Hubble weren't out of commission right now, this is the exact sort of discovery that would be great for it to take a look at. -------------------- &@^^!% Jim! I'm a geologist, not a physicist!
The Gish Bar Times - A Blog all about Jupiter's Moon Io |
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Jun 23 2021, 09:43 AM
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#51
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Member Group: Members Posts: 239 Joined: 28-October 12 Member No.: 6732 |
Hera will have a spacecraft monitoring camera onboard.
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Jun 26 2021, 06:46 PM
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#52
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Member Group: Members Posts: 444 Joined: 1-July 05 From: New York City Member No.: 424 |
QUOTE Incoming Visitor From the Oort Cloud Could Be Among the Largest Comets Ever Documented The newly detected object is somewhere between 62 and 230 miles long. https://gizmodo.com/incoming-visitor-from-t...-the-1847149513 The Gizmodo article linked above contains a useful summary of the discovery of and prospects for 2014 UN271, with interesting comments from several astronomers. There is also a link to several tweets from Dr. Pedro Bernardinelli @phbernardinelli, a PhD candidate in physics & astronomy at the University of Pennsylvania who led the discovery project, a search for Trans Neptunian Objects using the massive data set created by the Dark Energy Survey, https://www.darkenergysurvey.org/. Dr. Bernardinelli's feed is currently full of additional information and links. Among other things, he explained something that had puzzled me, namely why an object so recently identified was assigned a 2014 designator. The discovery was the result of a computationally intense analysis of images acquired between 2014 and 2018 within a big data feed. There is no single "discovery image," and by convention they used the date of the earliest image. See https://twitter.com/Tom_Ruen/status/1406952833774145540 |
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Jul 19 2021, 06:15 AM
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#53
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Member Group: Members Posts: 239 Joined: 28-October 12 Member No.: 6732 |
Nice presentation about JAXA's DESTINY+ expedition to (3200) Phaethon.
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Nov 27 2021, 04:12 PM
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#54
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 Member Group: Members Posts: 127 Joined: 15-April 21 Member No.: 9009 |
QUOTE (machi @ Oct 21 2014, 12:40 AM) I cannot found better topic than this one so I apologize for reanimation of this old topic. Here is my collage of all cometary nuclei imaged by spacecrafts and planetary radars at 25 m/pix. Now it's with C/2013 A1 Siding Spring. your missing 46P 
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Nov 27 2021, 06:11 PM
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#55
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Founder Group: Chairman Posts: 14432 Joined: 8-February 04 Member No.: 1 |
QUOTE (TrappistPlanets @ Nov 27 2021, 08:12 AM) your missing 46P You’re missing the fact that the RADAR image you show is from 2018 and Machi’s composite is from 2014. |
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Jan 20 2022, 08:27 PM
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#56
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Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 2086 Joined: 13-February 10 From: Ontario Member No.: 5221 |
NEA Scout has a (tiny!) target:
https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/nasa-solar-sa...rtemis-i-launch 2020 GE, about half the size of Habauysa2's target (and getting there a lot sooner, apparently after an Earth flyby by the rock in 2023. Flyby velocity of only 30 m/s is another record. |
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Jan 21 2022, 08:01 PM
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#57
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Member Group: Members Posts: 436 Joined: 14-December 15 Member No.: 7860 |
QUOTE (Explorer1 @ Jan 20 2022, 09:27 PM) NEA Scout has a (tiny!) target: https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/nasa-solar-sa...rtemis-i-launch 2020 GE, about half the size of Habauysa2's target (and getting there a lot sooner, apparently after an Earth flyby by the rock in 2023. Flyby velocity of only 30 m/s is another record. It will be almost like watching a meteoroid through the window of an airplane flying with it - but before it enters the Earth's atmosphere 
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