Rosetta Takes Stunning Self-Portrait 10 Miles From Comet's Surface

astroengine writes: At a distance of only 10 miles from comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko's surface, the European Rosetta mission has captured yet another dazzling self portrait with the dark comet lurking in the background. But the orbiter couldn't have snapped this picture without the help of a little friend — the attached Philae lander that is currently undergoing preparations for its historic comet surface landing in November.

Let's see if the EU predictions are correct.

[trout007]

https://www.thunderbolts.info/... [thunderbolts.info]

Re:

[r1348]

Hopefully better than the EU's economic predictions...

Re:

[davester666]

Article correction: it did NOT take a picture of itself/a selfie. The lander took a picture of it's transporter, with the asteroid photobombing the picture.

Re:

[Charliemopps]

https://www.thunderbolts.info/... [thunderbolts.info]

We are just as likely to find a tribe of bigfoot living on it. And no, I'm not kidding. There would have to be as much wrong with modern sience for the Electric Universe to be correct, that Vacuum loving Sasquatches would be equally as likely.

That's called a Selfie

[Anonymous Coward]

Get with the times, old fart.

Re:That's called a Selfie

[oodaloop]

I prefer "Lawn Clearance Technician".

Typical Rosetta

[slazzy]

Typical... yet more showing off from self-absorbed Rosetta and her selfies. I bet she posts them right to her Facebook account too.

Re:Typical Rosetta

[Chocolate Teapot]

At least it didn't pull a duck face.

Re:

[mythosaz]

Rosetta has no clothes on. Scandalous.

Re:

[Andrio]

Even our most advanced space robots aren't immune to taking selfies.

Miles?

[Grizzley9]

"At a distance of only 10 miles from comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko's surface, the European Rosetta mission..."

An EU mission using miles as a distance calculation...we've seen this movie before unfortunately.

Re:Miles?

[Punko]

Its miles only in the summary; the article is in SI units. Apparently, someone believes that folks on Slashdot either don't know what a kilometer is or are incapable of converting them to another unit of measurement.

Re:

[oodaloop]

The outcry seems to be mostly from self-righteous Europeans who look down on anyone using any unit that came before the metric system. Most Americans I know don't have strong feelings either way about the whole thing.

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[geekoid]

I have very strong feeling about it. I could, and have, write a 4000 word essay breaking down exactly why we should be metric, showiunf examples of harm from not being metric, as well as the long term impact of how other countries perceive us.

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[weilawei]

Yep. Both systems work just fine. Conversions aren't hard. I also enjoy the FFF system of units (furlong/firkin/fortnight).

Re:

[MildlyTangy]

Personally, I would have gone with 176 football fields.

Which sort of Football? Soccer? Rugby? American football? AFL?

Re:

[geekoid]

Probable American football, since it's the only one with a single regulation field size.

Re:

[Punko]

Except for Canadian Football. But then you'd not want to use our field, its bigger

Re:

[sconeu]

Sounds like *SOMEONE* in Canada is trying to... overcompensate...

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[MoaDweeb]

Rugby Union sets it as 100m * 70m http://www.nzrugby.co.nz/the_g... [nzrugby.co.nz]

Re:

[MildlyTangy]

Its miles only in the summary; the article is in SI units. Apparently, someone believes that folks on Slashdot either don't know what a kilometer is or are incapable of converting them to another unit of measurement.

I think its mainly because everybody thinks only Muricans read Slashdot. Hence all the US centric articles and odd measurement units.

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[CODiNE]

That's easy!

A kilometer is 1000MB
A kibimeter is 1024MB
(Assuming a bitrate of 256mb/sec)

Re:

[Livius]

I think you mean a kilometre.

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[steelfood]

They took the picture 16km out, which conveniently converts nicely to an even 10 miles. It's like they wanted Americans to convert.

Good!

[spiritplumber]

If the public catches wind of a new space race that the US is losing, then NASA will get more money! Excellent!

Re:

[mmell]

Well, it costs a lot of time, effort and money to get anything to or from our moon, and even more to get anything to any of the planetary bodies in our solar system. If we want to exploit space, we might wan to consider exploiting those resources which are nearest to us. Comets and asteroids fill the bill there, so we might want to start by learning if there is anything worth exploiting there.

Historic?

[fustakrakich]

A tiny bit presumptuous, no?

Re:Historic?

[exploder]

I agree that the word "historic" is probably overapplied, but come on, it's going to land on a fucking comet for the first time in, uh, what's that word I'm looking for? Oh yeah, history.

Re:

[MozeeToby]

Historic
Adj.
1) famous or important in history, or potentially so.

If you're going to be pedantic, you need to at least be accurate.

Re:

[fustakrakich]

famous or important in history

History - a study of past events. An event has the potential of being historic after it happens.

Read the rest of the thread. I don't feel like repeating myself.

Re:

[geekoid]

"famous or important in history, or potentially so."
So yes, historic.

Re:

[fustakrakich]

It still relates to past (the definition of history) events, which may have the potential to become historic. Some events become historic immediately after they happen, and some a long time afterwards, but not before.

Like you say there: important in *history*

Re:

[Punko]

And, for Christ's sake, that's not a self-portrait any more than me taking a picture of my arm is a self-portrait.


You mean a bad self-portrait ??

Re:

[Last_Available_Usern]

Of course it is. It's two exposures (one short and one long) combined into one frame to accurately show the detail on both the spacecraft and the asteroid.

Re:

[Last_Available_Usern]

Comet, sorry.

Not quite complete

[SlowMovingTarget]

Needs a banana for scale.