Lords of Death Forums Lords of Death Forums LoD General Discussion Deep Impact Headed - Interesting Read

Deep Impact Headed for July 4 Crash with Comet

This July 4, NASA is preparing for fireworks in space, when the comet Tempel 1 will smash into a probe set in its path. Scientists hope the mission, called Deep Impact, will reveal what comets are made of and how they're put together.
As it nears Tempel 1, the Deep Impact mother ship will release an impactor to be hit by the comet at 23,000 mph. The impactor carries a copper slug weighing more than 300 pounds -- to ensure the collision packs a punch -- and an onboard guidance system to keep the oncoming comet in its crosshairs.
Just before 2 a.m. Eastern Monday, the spacecraft will .... go the link to read on
Deep Impact Story

Yeah I'm keepin up on that... Just hope this has more success than the Mars missions.
-Bal.

About 3 years ago JPL launched a 2 part weather surveyor and rover, both of which crashed... and were never heard from.
Apparantly though this comet buster went off with out a hitch... Its a pretty damn impressive feat considering they hit this comet that is some 80+ million miles away... Should be interesting to see what kind of data they get from this thing...
-Bal.

The mars mission? The rovers landed and took samples and shit didn't they?

The "other" Mars Missions about 4-5 years ago... the weather surveyor and the rover that was to follow... both were lost, unless they somehow got a signal from the rover at some later date.
Anyways, sounds like this Deep Impact program worked out... looking forward to some of the pics that will be sent back.
-Bal.

Ya same I was reading about it again tonight really interested in seein some of the pics.

Any pics up yet?

Here is some pictures I looked at this morning: http://deepimpact.jpl.nasa.gov/home/index.html
http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/deepimpact/multimedia/070405-its-approach-x4.html

http://www.cnn.com/2005/TECH/space/07/04/deep.impact.sues.reut/index.html