The Deep Impact spacecraft passed by Earth on Monday

The spacecraft that released a probe in 2005 that crashed into the comet Temple-1 is making its way to rendezvous with another comet in 2010. This time just to watch him closely

(On the occasion of the news, we transferred the main news about Operation Deep Impact from the old site to a special expert for this spacecraft, see the link in "Informants" at the bottom of this news before the comments)

Last Monday, the Deep Ipemact spacecraft passed by the planet from which it took off for the first time. The near-Earth pass, the first of three planned, provided the small spacecraft (which on the NASA website compares its size to the size of a Volkswagen Beetle model car) acceleration that will help it reach the encounter with comet Hartley-2 in 2010. At the closest point of Deep Impact is About 16 km passed over Australia.

"We send the spacecraft to orbit the Sun several times until the comet arrives," says William Bloom, of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, California.

As you may remember, in 2005, Deep Impact became the first spacecraft to release a smaller spacecraft that was used as a projectile (IMPACTOR) which crashed into comet Temple-1 and provided scientists with their first glimpse of the interior of a comet. The mother ship survived this explosion and was placed in a safe orbit, until it was decided where to send it (because the fuel inside allowed it to arrive, with the help of additional space maneuvers such as the approach to Earth). And the target set is Comet Hartley 2, and the meeting will take place at a distance of about 19 million km from Earth. The spacecraft, which has no more projectiles to release, will hover at an altitude of about a thousand km above the surface of the comet, which is about one km long, and will use the two telescopes and the infrared spectrometer on its surface to map and record gas eruptions from the comet.

En route to the encounter with the comet, the Deep Impact spacecraft will spend six months observing through one of its telescopes to search for Earth-like planets around five nearby stars, around which planets the size of Jupiter and larger have been detected.

The extended mission, named Epoxy, is managed by JPL at a cost of 40 million dollars, this compared to the cost of the original operation of the crash of the bullet on the comet Temple-1 which cost NASA 333 million dollars.

Initially, NASA wanted to launch Deep Impact for a close encounter with comet 85P/Boethin in 2008, but unfortunately, telescopes from the rift and space failed to locate the comet last fall. Astronomers believe that the comet may have broken into pieces too small to be seen from Earth.

The mission managers asked NASA for permission to change the destination to Hartley 2, a change that involves correcting the route and adding two years to the journey.

Summary of Deep Impact's mission in 2005