APOD: Rosetta's Target Comet (2014 May 23)

Comments and questions about the APOD on the main view screen.
ta152h0
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Re: APOD: Rosetta's Target Comet (2014 May 23)

Post by ta152h0 » Fri May 23, 2014 5:12 pm

as far as landing on an object of low gravity ? Remember EROS ? I just hope they remember the units they use to measure with
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Re: APOD: Rosetta's Target Comet (2014 May 23)

Post by RJN » Fri May 23, 2014 6:34 pm

Gruyere wrote:Mmmmmmmmm ,,, gob-ular
"Globular." Fixed it. Sorry. - RJN

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Re: APOD: Rosetta's Target Comet (2014 May 23)

Post by Jim Leff » Fri May 23, 2014 11:52 pm

geckzilla wrote:Landing on something with such low surface gravity has its own challenges.
The landing part just sounds difficult. It's the orbiting part I can't understand.

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Re: APOD: Rosetta's Target Comet (2014 May 23)

Post by Chris Peterson » Sat May 24, 2014 2:41 pm

Jim Leff wrote:The landing part just sounds difficult. It's the orbiting part I can't understand.
Why? Any two massive bodies will orbit each other given the proper velocity.
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Re: APOD: Rosetta's Target Comet (2014 May 23)

Post by Jim Leff » Sat May 24, 2014 3:31 pm

Chris Peterson wrote:Any two massive bodies will orbit each other given the proper velocity.
The orbiter has the mass of a pickup truck. The comet has the mass of a small asteroid - much less mass than Everest.

Or by "massive" do you mean "containing any mass at all"?

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Re: APOD: Rosetta's Target Comet (2014 May 23)

Post by Chris Peterson » Sat May 24, 2014 4:10 pm

Jim Leff wrote:The orbiter has the mass of a pickup truck. The comet has the mass of a small asteroid - much less mass than Everest.

Or by "massive" do you mean "containing any mass at all"?
Yes.

By my quick calculation, the orbital speed works out to around 3 cm/s for a 200 km radius orbit.
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Re: APOD: Rosetta's Target Comet (2014 May 23)

Post by Jim Leff » Sat May 24, 2014 4:18 pm

Chris Peterson wrote:
Jim Leff wrote:The orbiter has the mass of a pickup truck. The comet has the mass of a small asteroid - much less mass than Everest.

Or by "massive" do you mean "containing any mass at all"?
Yes.

By my quick calculation, the orbital speed works out to around 3 cm/s for a 200 km radius orbit.

Just doesn't seem intuitive to me. But nobody ever said physics had to be intuitive!

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