Mission Controllers are still in control of Rosetta. A space craft sent to space to chase and plant a lander on a comet to enable scientists study and understand it better.
It happened on Monday, Jaunary 20, 2014, when after hibernating for 31 months since 8 June 2011, scientists decided napping times for the spacecraft had lapsed and it was time to wake up. It was a distant 673million kilometers from the Sun.
Well not quite, actually since June 28, 2012 scientists had decided that her waking date and time will be on Monday 20 January, 2014 at 10:00 UTC, she was free to sleep on.
But even restarting a machine that has been idle for near two years can be tough, and Rossetta was not diferent.
Anyway, at 10.00am on Monday, she was called to Wake Up! Then, Rosetta's star trackers warm up, her Thrusters fire up and rotation slows.
Gradually she turned and her Solar arrays face directly towards the Sun. She then began a slower rotation.
But where was she and how does she start her work? So her Star trackers began work to determine her attitude. She then rotates towards earth. As her Antenna points towards our planet, she began sending signal towards Earth.
Eventually, the signals were received at Mission Control at ESA’s Operations Centre in Darmstadt, Germany. Rosetta will now begin to track and pursue her target - the Comet 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko.
Rosetta is set to become the "first mission to rendezvous with a comet, the first to land on a comet and the first to follow a comet around the Sun." ESA said.
Today ESA said Rosetta Spacecraft Operations Manager, Andrea Accomazzo, confirms the Rosetta spacecraft is doing fine!
A great adventure in space research has indeed begun.
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* Image Credit: ESA/SpaceInImages.
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