Rosetta will approach to the comet Churyumov Gerasimenko at a distance of 10 kilometers

Today's blog was published by Rosetta interesting news: a few days interplanetary station will go with the 20-kilometer orbit at 10km. Rather, the first orbit of the circular (18.6 km) will be changed into an elliptical (18.6 * 9.8 km) by 10 October. After this, the machine will go into a circular orbit of 10 km with an orbital period of 66 hours, by 15 October.

After the transition to this low orbit will begin a new phase of the project, which is called "Close Observation Phase" (COP). At this stage it will be made images of the surface of the comet with high resolution, which will be used to finalize the landing of a comet.



The new orbit will allow to use scientific tools Rosetta. In particular, it will be collected dust samples, and the analysis of the composition of the gases near the nucleus of the comet.

Low orbit interplanetary station will be up until October 28, and then begin prelanding stage. The orbit of the station changed to become elliptical, with an average radius of 30 km. After another change of orbit station will issue a landing probe Philae, at the distance of 22, 5 km from the surface of the nucleus.

Planting of the probe to the surface of the comet scheduled for 12 November. About what kind of work will perform Philae, written can read here . As the main point of the landing area selected J:







The landing is likely to look like this:



Via esa

Source: habrahabr.ru/post/239755/