Philae lander separates from craft on mission to land on 34,000mph comet

Mission control has made contact with the Philae lander during its desecent onto a speeding comet, as scientists reveal the rock is emitting a mysterious ‘song’. There were cheers and hugs in the European Space Agency (ESA) control room when the probe’s detachment from the Rosetta spacecraft was confirmed shortly after 9am. The agency tweeted : “SEPARATION CONFIRMED #SEP ESA confirms @Philae2014 Lander has separated from @ESA_Rosetta. Lander now enroute to #CometLanding”. The first signal from the detached lander came two hours later.

Everyone’s nervous, everyone’s on tenterhooks, but we know the risk is worth taking. The rewards are enormous.

Mark McCaughrean, European Space Agency senior science advisor

It said Philae would now have deployed its landing gear, ready to fire its harpoons and latch on to the giant ball of dust and ice. The lander will also drill ‘ice screws’ from each of its feet to stay fixed to the speeding rock. The landmark mission, which hopes to become the first to dock with a comet, is taking place 315 million miles from Earth as the rock hurtles through space at around 34,000mph. The probe, roughly the size of a dishwasher, is descending at walking pace and the final descent for the £1bn mission will take seven hours. News of whether it has been successful is expected at around 4pm UK time.

Landing gear will absorb the forces of the landing while ice screws in each of the probe’s feet and a harpoon system will lock Philae to the surface. We’ll need some luck not to land on a boulder or a steep slope

Lander Manager Stephan Ulamec

Science comet