Comet probe Philae wakes up, tweets ‘Hello Earth!’
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THE European space probe Philae woke up overnight after nearly seven months in hibernation as it hurtled toward the Sun on the back of a comet, mission control said yesterday.
The tiny robot lab may be ready to resume science work, adding a fresh chapter to its extraordinary voyage, excited officials said.
“Hello Earth! Can you hear me?” the washing machine-sized lander tweeted under the hashtag #WakeUpPhilae.
“We got a two-minute ... successful communication” at 2028 GMT on Saturday, mission manager Patrick Martin said from the operations center in Madrid.
“This was sufficient to confirm that Philae is healthy and that its sub-systems are OK in terms of energy and temperature for ongoing communication with Rosetta,” he said, referring to the lander’s mothership orbiting Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko.
The mission seeks to unlock the long-held secrets of comets — primordial clusters of ice and dust that scientists believe may reveal how the Solar System was formed.
The 100-kilogram robot lab touched down on “67P” on November 12 after an epic 10-year trek piggybacking on Rosetta.
But instead of harpooning itself onto the dusty iceball’s surface, Philae bounced several times before settling at an angle in a dark ditch.
It had enough stored battery power for about 60 hours of experiments, enabling it to send home reams of data before going into standby mode on November 15.
As “67P” drew closer to the Sun, scientists hoped better light would recharge Philae’s batteries enough for it to reboot, then make contact, and ultimately carry out a new series of experiments.
After two failed bids to make contact in March and April, a new attempt was launched in May.
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