You know how sometimes you're going somewhere, and it seems to take forever to get there, and all you can think is "are we there yet!?"
Now image a journey that started in 2004 (or 1993 actually...!), and it took until May this year to get where you were going: that's ESA's "Rosetta" mission!
The "comet chaser" "Rosetta" was launched in March 2004, to rendezvous with the comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko this year, after having been in hibernation mode for almost 10 years...!
And although the final correction manoeuvres started May 7th, they will still take until August to complete...! Then, while Rosetta studies the comet from orbit, the lander "Philae" will become the first spacecraft to ever land on a comet! ;o)
Why am I telling you all this? (besides because it's very interesting of course! ;o)
Because Martin Rützler tweeted to me about an article on the Clear Sky-Blog, about a papercraft model of ESA's "Rosetta" comet chaser and an accompanying competition from the ESA website! ;o)
To celebrate the last leg of Rosetta's epic 10-year voyage, the European Space Agency is having a contest fittingly called "Rosetta, are we there yet?" (deadline 07:00 GMT August 6th 2014!):
Anybody in the world has a chance to win the runner up prizes (Rosetta water bottles, posters, t-shirts, stickers and pin badges) but people from ESA-member or cooperating states, the European Union or the USA also have the chance to win the main prize of witnessing the actual landing of Philae on Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko at ESA's Operations Center in Germany in November this year!
To enter the competition, you need to take a picture of yourself having a "are we there yet!?" moment (try to use the Rosetta paper model and/or do something relating to the Rosetta mission to increase your chances! ;o) and then post it on the Rosetta Mission Facebook page, or on Instagram or Twitter using the hashtag #RosettaAreWeThereYet
You can read all about the "Rosetta, are we there yet?" contest here:
And be sure to read the full rules too of course: rules !
If you want to use the Rosetta paper model for your photos (and why wouldn't you? ;o) you can get it here: http://www.esa.int/spaceinimages/Images/2014/07/Build_a_Rosetta_model
(click the blue "DOWNLOAD HI-RES JPG" buttons on ESA's Rosetta multimedia website)
Good luck if you want to enter the contest, and have fun building! ;o)
Hello,
ReplyDeletethanks that you link to my blog. I'm happy about this.
Stefan
A person mentioned your article to me on Twitter, to show me the ESA paper model and contest. I saw your pictures of course, your papercraft Rosetta looks very neat! ;o)
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