National Aeronautics and Space Administration Deep Impact has deep space experience with Comet Hartley 2

A space probe called Deep Impact intended by National Aeronautics and Space Administration passed closely by Comet Hartley 2 and sent striking pictures back to Earth Thurs. Five years earlier, Deep Impact launched a probe and took pictures of Comet Tempel 1. Comet Hartley 2 had been discovered by Hartley, an Australian astronomer who was at the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., when pictures of his namesake arrived. Resource for this article – NASA Deep Impact has deep space encounter with Comet Hartley 2 by Personal Money Store.

Encounter in deep space

Scientists at the JPL Labs were really excited when NASA's Deep Impact spacecraft sent the first photos from the Comet Hartley 2 encounter. The nucleus of the remark looked like it was a ball of ice that was shaped like a drumstick and had glowing jets of gas coming off it while it had been three quarters a mile across. The spacecraft was in space for five years and had traveled 2.5 billion miles. Going at a speed of 27,000 mph, it flew past the Comet Hartley.

What the NASA Deep Impact mission had been

Scientists study comets because they harbor original ingredients from the formation of the solar system about 4.5 billion years ago. In January 2005, Comet Tempel 1 was visited by NASA's Deep Impact mission. An 800-pound copper projectile had been launched to the nucleus after it got there. The composition of the comet had been measured by sensors. Deep Impact was then sent to rendezvous with Comet Boethin in 2008, but that comet broke up and disappeared when the spacecraft was en route. It had been rerouted to Hartley 2, which took another two years to reach.

Facts about deep space missions with NASA

Comet Hartley wasn't the first photographed comet by deep space probes. It had been actually the fifth. The other four are Halley, Wild 2, Borelli and Tempel 1. The comets don't look the very same at all. There are distinct differences. In 2006, the NASA spacecraft Stardust passed Comet Wild 2. When passing, grains of dust from its tail were captured. Later it sent the dust in a capsule back to Earth and moved on for another rendezvous with the target of Deep Impact’s first mission, Tempel 1, on Valentine's Day 2011.

Articles cited

New York Times

nytimes.com/2010/11/02/science/space/02comet.html?_r=2&src=twrhp

Christian Science Monitor

csmonitor.com/Science/2010/1020/Comet-Hartley-2-to-swing-by-Earth-Wednesday

CNET

news.cnet.com/8301-19514_3-20021786-239.html