Rosetta’s final path

Animation of Rosetta’s final trajectory in the last 10 days of its mission at Comet 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko.

On 24 September 2016, Rosetta will leave a close flyover orbit and transfer into the start of a 16 x 23 km orbit that will be used to prepare and line up for the final descent. In the evening of 29 September (20:50 GMT) Rosetta will manoeuvre onto a collision course with the comet, beginning the descent from an altitude of 19 km. The spacecraft will fall freely, without further manoeuvres, collecting scientific data during the descent.

The trajectory shown in this animation is created from real data provided in the last month, but may not necessarily follow the exact distance/time details because of natural deviations in the trajectory associated with the comet’s gravity and outgassing.

Find out more about Rosetta at:
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[guaip]

0:35 The exact moment when it says "ah, f*ck it"

[PPUR]

Why is it destroyed rather than have it put into sleep

[ahaveland]

Now that they found Philae, it would have been great if they could have used Rosetta to nudge it or hook it out of its crevice.
The freefall landing velocity will be low anyway, but why not use a small amount of fuel to soften the landing and extend the time available for data collection?

[tiuk]

Why retrothrusters wont launch just before landing to minimize probability of critical damage?

[Cubenga]

Is it spinning "that fast"? :S Isn't that a problem?

[mattq]

But why to destroy it in the first place?

[ReYDeRk]

Разбили апарат потому что уже устали произносить название кометы. Бля иностранцев попробуй такой выговорить. Блин