Rosetta Has Arrived, and the View is Astounding

This animation comprises 101 images acquired by the Navigation Camera on the European Space Agency's Rosetta spacecraft as it approached comet 67P/C-G. The first image was taken on August 1, 2014, and the last on August 6 at a distance of 110 kilometers, or 68 miles. (Source: ESA/Rosetta/Navcam) It took five loops around the Sun, three gravity-assist fly-bys of Earth and one of Mars, and a journey of 3.97 billion miles lasting 10 years, five months and four days. After all that, the Rosetta spacecraft finally reached it destination today — and made history. Rosetta is the first spacecraft ever to rendezvous with a comet. It is now in quasi-orbit (more about that in a minute) around comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko. For more than a year, it will take pictures and gather data, and it will also send a lander down to the surface, all in a quest to help us understand the origin and evolution of the solar system. In so doing, it will tell us something of our own origins. The animation above records the final leg of that long and lonesome journey. It consists of 101 images taken by the probe's navigation camera as it approached the comet, the first from Aug. 1 and the last from today.