Animation of Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko as seen by Rosetta on June 27-28, 2014
This is really getting exciting! ESA’s Rosetta spacecraft (and the piggybacked Philae lander) are in the home stretch to arrive at Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko in 34 days and the comet is showing up quite nicely in Rosetta’s narrow-angle camera. The animation above, assembled from 36 NAC images acquired last week, shows 67P/C-G rotating over a total elapsed time of 12.4 hours. No longer just an extra-bright pixel, it looks like a thing now!
The animation, although fascinating, only hints at the “true” shape of the comet’s nucleus. Reflected light does create a bloom effect in the imaging sensor, especially at such small resolutions, expanding the apparent size of the comet beyond its 4-by-4-pixel size. But rest assured that much, much better images are on the way as Rosetta gets closer and closer.
The spacecraft was about 86,000 km (53,440 miles) from 67P/C-G when the images were acquired. Since that time it has cut that distance in half, and by this weekend it will be less than 36,000 km (22,370 miles) from the comet. After more than a decade of traveling around the inner Solar System Rosetta is finally arriving at its goal! Click here to see where Rosetta is now.
Stay tuned for more exciting updates from Rosetta, and learn more about the mission below:
Diagram of Comet 67P/C-G compared to terrestrial landmarks (ESA)
Pretty darn big, I’d say.
The illustration above shows the relative scale of the comet that ESA’s Rosetta and Philae spacecraft will explore “up-close and personal” later this year. And while it’s one thing to say that the nucleus of Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko is about three by five kilometers in diameter, it’s quite another to see it in context with more familiar objects. Think about it — a comet as tall as Mt Fuji!
Artist’s impression (not to scale) of the Rosetta orbiter deploying the Philae lander to comet 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko. Credit: ESA–C. Carreau/ATG medialab.
At the time of this writing Rosetta is 35 days out on approach to Comet 67P/C-G, at a distance of about 51,000 km (31,700 miles) and closing. Three “big burn” maneuvers have already been performed between May 7 and June 4 to adjust the spacecraft’s course toward the incoming comet, and after smaller ones on June 18 and July 2 there are a total of five more to go. See details of Rosetta’s burn maneuvers here.
Luckily the remaining burns are relatively small compared to the first three, with the final being very brief, so any data contamination by Rosetta’s own exhaust shouldn’t become an issue once the spacecraft has established orbit in August.
Launched in March 2004, ESA’s Rosetta mission will be the first to orbit and land a probe on a comet, observing its composition and behavior as it makes its close approach to the Sun in 2015. Click here to see where Rosetta is right now.
Note: While 3-5 km seems pretty big (especially when stood on end) comet nuclei can be much larger, 10 to 20 km in diameter up to the enormous 40+ km size of Hale-Bopp. As comets go, 67P/C-G is fairly average. (Except that, come August, it will be the only comet with an Earthly spacecraft in tow!)
Artist's impression (from 2002) of Rosetta orbiting Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko. Credit: ESA, image by AOES Medialab
It’s no surprise that there is a lot of water in comets. The “dirty snowballs” (or dusty ice-balls, more accurately) are literally filled with the stuff, so much in fact it’s thought that comets played a major role in delivering water to Earth. But every comet is unique, and the more we learn about them the more we can understand the current state of our Solar System and piece together the history of our planet.
ESA’s Rosetta spacecraft is now entering the home stretch for its rendezvous with comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko in August. While it has already visually imaged the comet on a couple of occasions since waking from its hibernation, its instruments have now successfully identified water on 67P for the first time, from a distance of 360,000 km — about the distance between Earth and the Moon.
The detection comes via Rosetta’s Microwave Instrument for Rosetta Orbiter, or MIRO, instrument. The results were distributed this past weekend to users of the IAU’s Central Bureau of Astronomical Telegrams:
S. Gulkis, Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, on behalf of the Microwave Instrument on Rosetta Orbiter (MIRO) science team, reports that the (1_10)-(1_01) water line at 556.9 GHz was first detected in Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko with the MIRO instrument aboard the Rosetta spacecraft on June 6.55, 2014 UT. The line area is 0.39 +/-0.06 K km/s with the line amplitude of 0.48 +/-0.06 K and the line width of 0.76 +/-0.12 km/s. At the time of the observations, the spacecraft to comet distance was ~360,000 km and the heliocentric distance of the comet was 3.93 AU. An initial estimate of the water production rate based on the measurements is that it lies between 0.5 x 10^25 molecules/s and 4 x 10^25 molecules/s.
Although recent images of 67P/C-G seem to show that the comet’s brightness has decreased over the past couple of months, it is still on its way toward the Sun and with that will come more warming and undoubtedly much more activity. These recent measurements by MIRO show that the comet’s water production rate is “within the range of models being used” by scientists to anticipate its behavior.
Rosetta image of Comet 67P/C-G on June 4, 2014, from a distance of 430,000 km. Credits: ESA/Rosetta/MPS for OSIRIS Team MPS/UPD/LAM/IAA/SSO/INTA/UPM/DASP/IDA
This August Rosetta will become the first spacecraft to establish orbit around a comet and, in November, deploy its Philae lander onto its surface. Together these robotic explorers will observe first-hand the changes in the comet as it makes its closest approach to the Sun in August 2015. It’s going to be a very exciting year ahead, so stay tuned for more!
Comet 209P/LINEAR may still be faint but it's a beautiful object in this time exposure by Austrian astrophotographer Michael Jaeger. The stars appear as trails because the photographer followed the comet during the exposure.
As we anxiously await the arrival of a potentially rich new meteor shower this weekend, its parent comet, 209P/LINEAR, draws ever closer and brighter. Today it shines feebly at around magnitude +13.7 yet possesses a classic form with bright head and tail. It’s rapidly approaching Earth, picking up speed every night and hopefully will be bright enough to see in your telescope very soon.
As it approaches Earth in the coming nights, comet 209P/LINEAR will move quickly across the sky, traveling from Ursa Major to southern Hydra in just 10 days. When closest on May 28-29, the comet will cover 10 degrees per day or just shy of 1/2 degree per hour. All maps created with Chris Marriott’s SkyMap software
The comet was discovered in Feb. 2004 by the Lincoln Laboratory Near-Earth Asteroid Research (LINEAR) automated sky survey. Given its stellar appearance at the time of discovery it was first thought to be an asteroid, but photos taken the following month photos by Rob McNaught (Siding Spring Observatory, Australia) revealed a narrow tail. Unlike long period comets Hale-Bopp and the late Comet ISON that swing around the sun once every few thousand years or few million years, this one’s a frequent visitor, dropping by every 5.09 years.
This detailed map shows the comet’s path from Leo Minor across the backside of the Sickle of Leo May 23-26. Hopefully it will be bright enough then to spot in an 8-inch or larger telescope. On May 25, it passes close to the colorful double star Gamma Leonis and a pair of NGC galaxies. Stars plotted to magnitude +9. Click to enlarge and then print out for use at the telescope.
209P/LINEAR belongs to the Jupiter family of comets, a group of comets with periods of less than 20 years whose orbits are controlled by Jupiter. When closest at perihelion, 209P/LINEAR coasts some 90 million miles from the sun; the far end of its orbit crosses that of Jupiter. Comets that ply the gravitational domain of the solar system’s largest planet occasionally get their orbits realigned. In 2012, during a relatively close pass of that planet, Jupiter perturbed 209P’s orbit, bringing the comet and its debris trails to within 280,000 miles (450,000 km) of Earth’s orbit, close enough to spark the meteor shower predicted for this Friday night/Saturday morning May 23-24.
Track of the comet from May 27-29 through Sextans to the Hydra-Crater border with positions shown every 3 hours. Times are CDT. Click to enlarge.
This time around the sun, the comet itself will fly just 5.15 million miles (21 times the distance to the moon) from Earth around 3 a.m. CDT (8 hours UT) May 29 a little more than 3 weeks after perihelion, making it the 9th closest comet encounter ever observed. Given , you’d think 209P would become a bright object, perhaps even visible with the naked eye, but predictions call for it to reach about magnitude +11 at best. That means you’ll need an 8-inch telescope and dark sky to see it well. Either the comet’s very small or producing dust at a declining rate or both. Research published by Quanzhi Ye and Paul A. Wiegert describes the comet’s current dust production as low, a sign that 209P could be transitioning to a dormant comet or asteroid.
Light curve for comet 209P/LINEAR forecasts a maximum magnitude of around 11. Dates are shown along the bottom and magnitude scale along the side. Click for additional information. Credit: Seiichi Yoshida
Fortunately, the moon’s out of the way this week and next when 209P/LINEAR is closest and brightest. Since we enjoy comets in part because of their unpredictability, maybe a few surprises will be in the offing including a brighter than expected appearance. The maps will help you track down 209P during the best part of its apparition. I deliberately chose ‘black stars on a white background’ for clarity in use at the telescope. It also saves on printer ink!
A brand new meteor shower shooting 100 and potentially as many as 400 meteors an hour may radiate from the dim constellation Camelopardalis below the North Star Saturday morning May 24. Each is crumb or pebble of debris lost by 209P/LINEAR during earlier cycles around the sun. This map shows the sky facing north around 2 a.m. from the Saturday May 24 from the central U.S. Stellarium
We’re grateful for the dust 209P/LINEAR carelessly lost during its many passes in the 19th and early 20th centuries. Earth is expected to pass through multiple filaments of debris overnight Friday May 23-24 with the peak of at least 100 meteors per hour – about as good as a typical Perseid or Geminid shower – occurring around 2 a.m. CDT (7 hours UT).
If it’s cloudy or you’re not in the sweet zone for viewing either the comet or the potential shower, astrophysicist Gianluca Masi will offer a live feed of the comet at the Virtual Telescope Project website scheduled to begin at 3 p.m. CDT (8 p.m. Greenwich Time) May 22. A second meteor shower live feed will start at 12:30 a.m. CDT (5:30 a.m. Greenwich Time) Friday night/Saturday morning May 23-24.
SLOOH will also cover 209P/LINEAR live on the Web with telescopes on the Canary Islands starting at 5 p.m. CDT (6 p.m. EDT, 4 p.m. MDT and 3 p.m. PDT) May 23. Live meteor shower coverage featuring astronomer Bob Berman of Astronomy Magazine begins at 10 p.m. CDT. Viewers can ask questions by using hashtag #slooh.
Comet C/2013 UQ4, once thought to be an asteroid, now shows characteristics of a comet including a coma. This photo was made on May 7, 2014. Credit: Artyom Novichonok and Taras Prystavski
On October 23, 2013, astronomers with the Catalina Sky Survey picked up a very faint asteroid with an unusual orbit more like a that of a comet than an asteroid. At the time 2013 UQ4 was little more than a stellar point with no evidence of a hazy coma or tail that would tag it as a comet. But when it recently reappeared in the morning sky after a late January conjunction with the sun, amateur astronomers got a surprise.
On May 7, Comet ISON co-discoverer Artyom Novichonok, and Taras Prystavski used a remote telescope located in Siding Spring, Australia to take photos of 2013 UQ4 shortly before dawn in the constellation Cetus. Surprise, surprise. The asteroid had grown a little fuzz, making the move to comethood. No longer a starlike object, 2013 UQ4 now displays a substantial coma or atmosphere about 1.5 arc minutes across with a more compact inner coma measuring 25 arc seconds in diameter. No tail is visible yet, and while its overall magnitude of +13.5 won’t make you break out the bottle of champagne, it’s still bright enough to see in a 12-inch telescope under dark skies.
Wide field map showing the comet’s movement from Cetus through Pisces and into Cepheus in July when it becomes circumpolar for skywatchers at mid-northern latitudes. It should reach a peak brightness of 7th magnitude in early July. Click to enlarge. Created with Chris Marriott’s SkyMap program
The best is yet to come. Assuming the now renamed C/2013 UQ4 continues to spout dust and water vapor, it should brighten to magnitude +11 by month’s end as it moves northward across Pisces and into a dark morning sky. Perihelion occurs on June 5 with the comet reaching magnitude +8-9 by month’s end. Peak brightness of 7th magnitude is expected during its close approach of Earth on July 10 at 29 million miles (46.7 million km).
This should be a great summer comet, plainly visible in binoculars from a dark sky as it speeds across Cepheus and Draco during convenient viewing hours at the rate of some 7 degrees per night! That’s 1/3 of a degree per hour or fast enough to see movement through a telescope in a matter of minutes when the comet is nearest Earth.
Light curve showing C/2013 UQ4 brightening to a sharp peak in early July and then quickly fading. Created by Artyom Novichonok and Taras Prystavski
Come August, C/2013 UQ4 rapidly fades to magnitude +10 and then goes the way of so many comets – a return to a more sedentary lifestyle in the cold bones of deep space.
C/2013 UQ4 belongs to a special category of asteroids called damocloids (named for asteroid 5335 Damocles) that have orbits resembling the Halley-family comets with long periods, fairly steep inclinations and highly eccentric orbits (elongated shapes). Some, like Comet Halley itself, even travel backwards as they orbit the sun, an orbit astronomers describe as ‘retrograde’.
Evolution of a comet as it orbits the sun. Credit: Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Sciences/ NASA
Damocloids are thought to be comets that have lost all their fizz. With their volatile ices spent from previous trips around the sun, they stop growing comas and tails and appear identical to asteroids. Occasionally, one comes back to life. It’s happened in at least four other cases and appears to be happening with C/2013 UQ4 as well.
Studies of the comet/asteroid’s light indicate that UQ4 is a very dark but rather large object some 4-9 miles (7-15 km) across. It’s estimated that C/2013 UQ4 takes at least 500 years to make one spin around the sun. Count yourself lucky this damocloid decided to spend its summer vacation in Earth’s skies. We’ll have more detailed maps and updates as the comet becomes more easily visible next month. Stay tuned.
Composite photo of Lyrid meteor shower and non-Lyrids taken with a NASA All-sky camera April 21-23, 2012. Credit: NASA/MSFC/Danielle Moser
On Friday night/early Saturday May 23-24 skywatchers across the U.S. and southern Canada may witness the birth of a brand new meteor shower. If predictions hold true, Earth will pass through multiple tendrils of dust and pebbly bits left behind by comet 209P/LINEAR, firing up a celestial display on par with the strongest showers of the year. Or better.
Peter Jenniskens of the SETI Institute, who predicted a possible meteor storm associated with comet 209P/LINEAR. Credit: NASA
Earlier predictions called for a zenithal hourly rate or ZHR of 1,000 per hour, pushing this shower into the ‘storm’ category. ZHR is an idealized number based on the shower radiant located at the zenith under ideal skies. The actual number is lower depending on how far the radiant is removed from the zenith and how much light pollution or moonlight is present. Meteor expert Peter Jenniskens of the SETI Instituteand Finland’s Esko Lyytinen first saw the possibility of a comet-spawned meteor storm and presented their results in Jenniskens’ 2006 book Meteor Showers and Their Parent Comets.
Approximate location of the radiant (blue) of the 209P/LINEAR shower at the peak of the brief maximum around 2 a.m. CDT May 24. Between 100-400 meteors may radiate from the dim constellation of Camelopardalis near the North Star. This map shows the sky from the central U.S. Created with Stellarium
Quanzhi Ye and Paul Wiegert (University of Western Ontario) predict a weaker shower because of a decline in the comet’s dust production rate based on observations made during its last return in 2009. They estimate a rate of ~200 per hour.
On the bright side, their simulations show that the comet sheds larger particles than usual, which could mean a shower rich in fireballs. Other researchers predict rates between 200 and 40o per hour. At the very least, the Camelopardalids – the constellation from which the meteors will appear to originate – promise to rival the Perseids and Geminids, the year’s richest showers. Motivation for setting the alarm clock if there ever was.
Comet 209P/LINEAR on April 14, 2014. It’s currently very faint at around magnitude +17. Material shed by the comet during passes from 1898-1919 is expected to contribute to a May 23-24 shower. Credit: Ernesto Guido, Nick Howes, Martino Nicolini
Comet 209P/LINEAR, discovered in Feb. 2004 by the automated Lincoln Laboratory Near-Earth Asteroid Research (LINEAR) sky survey, orbits the sun every 5.04 years with an aphelion (most distant point from the sun) near Jupiter. In 2012, during a relatively close pass of that planet, Jupiter perturbed its orbit, bringing it to within 280,000 miles (450,000 km) of Earth’s orbit.
That set up a remarkably close encounter with our planet on May 29 when 209P will cruise just 5 million miles (8 million km) from Earth to become the 9th closest comet ever observed. Multiple debris trails shed by the comet as long ago as the 18th century will intersect our planet’s path 5 days earlier, providing the material for the upcoming meteor shower/storm.
Shining meekly around magnitude +17 at the moment, 209P/LINEAR could brighten to magnitude +11 as it speeds from the Big Dipper south to Hydra during the latter half of May. Closer to the BIG night, we’ll provide helpful maps for you to track it down in your telescope. Cool to think that both the shower and its parent comet will be on display at the same time.
The shaded area shows where the shower will be visible on May 23-24. North of the red line, the moon (a thick crescent) will be up during shower maximum around 2:10 a.m. CDT. Credit: Mikhail Maslov
The shower’s expected to last only a few hours from about 12:40-3:50 a.m. CDT with the best viewing locations in the U.S. and southern half of Canada. This is where the radiant will be up in a dark sky at peak activity. A thick crescent moon rises around 3-3:30 a.m. but shouldn’t pose a glare problem.
Meteors from 209P/LINEAR are expected to be bright and slow with speeds around 40,000 mph compared to an average of 130,000 mph for the Perseids. Most shower meteoroids are minute specks of rock, but the Camelopardalids contain a significant number of particles larger than 1mm – big enough to spark fireballs.
The dark “finger” represents streams of dust and rocks left behind by 209P/LINEAR during passes made from 1803 to 1924. Earth is shown intersecting the debris on May 23-24, 2014. Credit: Dr. Jeremie Vaubaillon
The farther north you live in the shaded area on the map, the higher the radiant stands in the northern sky and the more meteors you’re likely to see. Skywatchers living in the Deep South will see fewer shooting stars, but a greater proportion will be earthgrazers, those special meteors that skim the upper atmosphere and flare for an unusually long time before fading out.
To see the shower at its best, find a dark place with an open view to the north. Plan your viewing between 12:30 and 4 a.m. CDT (May 24), keeping the 2 a.m. forecast peak in mind. Maximum activity occurs around 3 a.m. Eastern, 1 a.m. Mountain and midnight Pacific time.
No one’s really certain how many meteors will show, but I encourage you to make the effort to see what could be a spectacular show.
Comet C/2012 K1 PANSTARRS displays two tails in this excellent image taken with an 8-inch f/2.8 telescope on April 20, 2014 from Austria. The shorter, brighter spike is the dust tail; the longer is the ion tail with distinct kinks caused by interactions with the solar wind.
Comets often play hard to get. That’s why we enjoy those rare opportunities when they pass close to naked eye stars. For a change, they’re easy to find! That’s exactly what happens in the coming nights when the moderately bright comet C/2012 K1 PANSTARRS slides past the end of the Big Dipper’s handle. I hope Rolando Ligustri’s beautiful photo, above, entices you roll out your telescope for a look.
Comet K1 PANSTARRS glides from northern Bootes up the handle of the Big Dipper this coming week not far from the bright star Alkaid and M51, the Whirlpool Galaxy. This map shows the sky facing east (west is at top, east at bottom) with stars to magnitude +11 and the comet’s position at 10 p.m. CDT daily. Click to enlarge and then print out a copy you can use at the telescope. Created with Chris Marriott’s SkyMap software
If you’ve put off viewing this fuzzball because it’s been lost in the wilds of northern Bootes too long, hesitate no more. I saw it several nights ago through a 15-inch (37-cm) scope and can report a teardrop-shaped coma with a bright, not-quite-stellar nucleus. The comet sports an 8 arc minute long faint tail (1/4 the diameter of the full moon) and glows around magnitude 9-9.5. Granted I observed from dark skies, but K1 PANSTARRS could even be seen faintly in the 10×50 finderscope, putting it within range of ordinary binoculars.
Use this map to get oriented. It shows the sky facing east around 10 o’clock in late April. The comet passes very near Alkaid on April 28-29. Stellarium
Ligustri’s photo shows both gas and dust tails, but most observers will probably pick up the dust tail and strain to see the other. The comet has been moving north and slowly waxing in brightness all winter and spring. Right now, it’s ideally placed for viewing in the early evening sky and remains up all night for northern hemisphere observers. On Monday and Tuesday April 28-29 it’s within 1 degree of Alkaid, the bright star at the end of the Dipper’s handle.
C/2012 K1 PANSTARRS, discovered in May 2012 with the Pan-STARRS 1 telescope from Hawaii, has been under observation a long time. Here on Sept. 13, 2013 it was a still a small, dim object of magnitude ~+13. Credit: Carl Hergenrother
In a 6-inch (15-cm) scope, expect to see a faint puff with a brighter core; observers with 8-inch and larger telescopes will more easily see the tail. K1 PANSTARRS continues to brighten through the spring and summer as it saunters from the Great Bear into Leo. In late July it will be too near the sun to view but re-emerge a month later in Hydra in the morning sky. Southern hemisphere skywatchers will be favored during the fall and early winter, though the comet will continue to hover very low in the southern morning sky for northerners. Predictions call for the PANSTARRS to reach peak brightness around magnitude +6 to +7 in mid-October.
Sounds like old C/2012 K1 will be around a good, long time. Why not get acquainted?
Rosetta's solar panels as seen by Philae's CIVA imaging system on April 14, 2014. Credit: ESA/Rosetta/Philae/CIVA
Philae is awake… and taking pictures! This image, acquired last night with the lander’s CIVA (Comet nucleus Infrared and Visible Analyzer) instrument, shows the left and right solar panels of ESA’s well-traveled Rosetta spacecraft, upon which the 100-kilogram Philae is mounted.
Philae successfully emerged from hibernation on March 28 via a wake-up call from ESA.
After over a decade of traveling across the inner Solar System, Rosetta and Philae are now in the home stretch of their ultimate mission: to orbit and achieve a soft landing on comet 67/P Churyumov-Gerasimenko. It will be the first time either feat has ever been attempted by a spacecraft. Read more here.
omet C/2014 E2 Jacques on April 1, 2014. Credit and copyright: Damian Peach.
We’ve got a hot comet on our hands. Comet Jacques barely cracked magnitude +11 at the time of its March 13 discovery, but just three weeks later, amateur astronomers have already spotted it in large binoculars at magnitude +9.5. Expert comet observer Michael Mattiazzo, who maintains the Southern Comets Homepage,predicts that if Comet Jacques continues its rapid rise in brightness, it might become faintly visible with the naked eye by July.
Discovery images of Comet Jacques by the SONEAR team show a small, condensed object with a short, faint tail. Credit: SONEAR
The comet’s currently inching across the southern constellation Antlia headed toward Puppis and Monoceros later this month. Observers describe it as “very diffuse” with a large, dim coma and moderately compact core. Photos show a short tail pointing east-northeast. This past weekend C/2014 E2 passed closest to the Earth at 89.3 million miles (144 million km) on its way to perihelion on July 2.
Comet Jacques photographed on April 3, 2014 when it was near two faint galaxies. Credit: Efrain Morales
Right now, observers in southern latitudes have the viewing advantage. As seen from South America and Australia, Comet Jacques floats high in the southwestern sky at nightfall. Observers in mid-northern latitudes can see it too, but have to set their sights lower. A week ago I tried tracking down this newcomer with a 37-cm (15-inch) Dobsonian reflector around 9 o’clock. With Jacques only 14 degrees high at the time I had to kneel beside the telescope to see into the eyepiece. Try as I might, I suspected only a fuzzy patch at best. Light pollution and low altitude were partly to blame, but Jacques’ diffuse appearance may have contributed to the uncertain observation. Other mid-northern latitude observers may have shared my sore kneecap experience in similar attempts.
Map dated April 16 showing Comet Jacques’ path from mid-April to mid-May. Positions are marked every 5 days with stars down to magnitude +8. Click to enlarge. Created with Chris Mariott’s SkyMap software
But that will soon change. C/2014 E2 continues to increase in altitude throughout the month, offering easier viewing as soon as mid-month. April 16 through early May the moon will be gone from the sky and provide a needed dark time slot for viewing the comet before it’s lost in evening twilight. Comet Jacques will likely be brighter than magnitude 9 as it slides from Puppis into Monoceros.
Find a place with a dark sky to the southwest and start looking at the end of evening twilight when the comet is highest. The map shows stars in reverse making it easier to use in crowded star fields.
Comet Jacques is approaching the sun from beneath (south of) the plane of the planets indicated by the dark blue curve of its orbit. It crosses northward later this spring (Iight blue). Credit: NASA/JPL
By mid-July, Comet Jacques will have passed perihelion 61 million miles (98 million km) from the sun and transition into the morning sky as it rapidly swings northward across Taurus, Auriga and Perseus. Though the comet will be half again as far from Earth as it is today, it’s expected to become considerably brighter and more condensed after a good “roasting” by the sun.
Frame from the Rosetta Mission simulation shows the probe and comet when closest to the sun in late 2015. Credit: INOVE
Hang onto your space helmets. With a few moves of the mouse, you can now follow the European Rosetta mission to its target comet with this interactive 3-D simulator. Go ahead and give it a click – it’s live! The new simulator was created by INOVE Space Models, the same group that gave us the 3-D solar system and Comet ISON interactive models.
The embedded version gives you a taste, so be sure to also check out the full-screen version. You can either click play to watch the mission from start to finish or you can drop it at key points by selecting from list of 11 highlights on the left side of your screen. A tick-tock at the bottom of the screen helps reference the time and what the spacecraft is doing at that moment in the video.
To interact with the model, simply click the screen. The action stops, allowing you to zoom in and out by scrolling; to change orbital viewpoints hold down the mouse button and drag. So easy!
Simulator view of Rosetta’s first Earth flyby / gravity assist in March 2005. The probe flew by Earth three times and Mars once to conserve fuel and send it beyond the asteroid belt to rendezvous with Comet Churyumov-Gerasimenko. Credit: INOVE
I like the realism of the simulation, the attention paid to the planets’ variable spin rates and orbital periods and how well model illustrates the complicated maneuvers required to “fling” the probe to Comet Churyumov-Gerasimenko. And I do mean fling. Watching the video from a face-on solar system perspective I was struck by how Rosetta’s flight path resembled a spiral after repeated gravity assists by Mars and Earth.
Rosetta heads toward Comet C-G after its final Earth flyby in this face-on view. Credit: INOVE
Whether you’re a teacher or an armchair space enthusiast looking for an easy-to-understand, graphic way to find out how Rosetta will meet its target, I doubt you’ll find a more effective tool.
