MOSCOW, November 12 (RIA Novosti) – Scientists have received the first images of the Comet 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko's surface made by the Philae spacecraft during its historic landing Wednesday, the European Space Agency (ESA) said.
The spacecraft landed successfully at approximately 15:30 GMT. Its touchdown report reached Earth some 30 minutes later.
The image was made by the spacecraft’s ROLIS (Rosetta Lander Imaging System) down-looking imager during the descent and shows the landing site from a distance of over 1 mile from the surface.
The lander reported on its Twitter account that harpoons supposed to attach it to the comet's surface did not fire. The ESA are currently working on the problem.
The Philae mission is to study the comet and its nucleus in order to help scientists determine whether comets brought water and simple organic molecules to Earth billions of years ago, paving the way for life.
