Sixty-nine days before it gets up-close-and-personal with a comet, NASA's Deep Impact spacecraft successfully photographed its quarry, comet Tempel 1, at a distance of 39.7 million miles. The image, taken on April 25, 2005, is the first of many comet portraits Deep Impact will take leading up to its historic comet encounter on July 4.
Name | Value | Additional Values |
---|---|---|
Target | 9P/Tempel | |
System | Periodic Comets | |
Target Type | Comet | |
Mission | Deep Impact | |
Instrument Host | Deep Impact | |
Host Type | Impactor | |
Instrument | Medium Resolution Instrument (MRI) | |
Detector | ||
Extra Keywords | Grayscale, Impact | |
Acquisition Date | ||
Release Date | 2005-04-27 | |
Date in Caption | 2005-04-25 | |
Image Credit | NASA/JPL/UMD | |
Source | photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/catalog/PIA07879 | |
Identifier | PIA07879 |