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NASA ends Deep Impact comet-hunting mission after eight years
After more than eight years, NASA's comet-hunting Deep Impact mission has come to an abrupt close. The agency has stopped trying to communicate with the mission probe after losing contact on August 8th. It's not clear what went wrong, but NASA suspects that it may have lost orientation control, guaranteeing that the Deep Impact vehicle would lose power and freeze. It's going out on a good note, however. Like NASA's Mars rovers, Deep Impact easily outlasted its intended lifespan -- after successfully intercepting the comet Tempel 1 in 2005, it went on to study three more comets as well as numerous exoplanets. We'll miss the probe's continued research, but its legacy should live on through other projects.
Crowd-funded group building asteroid-mapping telescope, saving Earth (video)
Just when you're numbing to robot, zombie and nuclear apocalypse scenarios, some old-fashioned asteroid paranoia pops up to surprise you. The B612 Foundation, which gets funding from, well, anyone, has just announced plans to launch Sentinel, a space telescope which will wander the vacuum cataloging asteroids in our inner solar system. Their goal is to track asteroid orbits and predict large impacts up to 100 years in advance, giving us plenty of time to find a solution (or enjoy our final days). Construction doesn't start til late fall, with the launch expected in around five years, so it won't be any use in disproving the 2012 doomsday believers out there. You can find out more about the project and donate to the foundation at the source link, or jump past the break for a video explanation, Aerosmith not included.
