Goodbye, Stardust

[n2doc]

NASA kills off comet hunter

22:46 25 March 2011 by David Shiga

NASA deliberately killed off its Stardust spacecraft on Thursday, burning up its last fuel reserves in an experiment designed to help engineers plan future missions.

Stardust launched in 1999 and in 2004 became the first and so far only mission to collect samples of comet dust when it flew by comet Wild 2. The samples parachuted to Earth in a capsule in 2006.

But the Stardust spacecraft itself kept flying. Because it was still healthy, NASA decided to repurpose it, tweaking its orbit to meet comet Tempel 1 on 14 February of this year.

On Thursday, NASA commanded the spacecraft to burn up its remaining fuel in a suicidal blaze of glory. Without fuel, it will no longer be able to control its orientation in space to keep its solar panels pointed at the sun. It is expected to run out of power as a result.

more

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn20299-nasa-kills-off-comet-hunter.html

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