Geek Impact

Some serious fireworks are planned for July 4, 2005. Serious in this case meaning both major and purposeful. Too back we won't get to see them.

On the other hand, maybe that's not such a bad thing, since these fireworks involve an explosion equal to about 4.5 tons of TNT that might produce a crater the size of a football stadium. That's some serious fireworks. What makes this a serious undertaking is where that blast will take place: a comet.

The Deep Impact spacecraft launched from Earth on Wednesday to begin a mission that will end with a mighty impact into the heart of Comet Tempel 1.

The probe took off on a Delta 2 rocket at 1347 EST from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Florida, US. The spacecraft was expected to separate from the rocket 35 minutes after launch.

Deep Impact will take six months to travel the 431 million kilometres to its rendezvous. ...

The craft will finally approach the comet on 4 July 2005 and release a 372-kilogram sacrificial "impactor" spacecraft into its path. The mothership will then fire its engines to change its course and safely record the show from over 500 km away.

The collision between the impactor and the comet, at about 23,000 miles per hour (36,700 km/hour), should blast away some of the surface layers of the comet and reveal some of the interior. With a lot still unknown about comets, this should provide valuable data.

If the $267-million mission succeeds, it will be the first time a spacecraft has made contact with a comet. The European Space Agency's Rosetta mission, launched in 2004, is scheduled to land on Comet Churyumov-Gerasimenko in 2014.

Land on a comet. Cool. That would even beat out landing on an asteroid.