Huygens probe to be released Christmas Eve
24 December 2004
by Richard
Conan-Davies
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The Cassini-Huygens mission, a joint project betweeen NASA and ESA, is due to release the the Huygens probe on a pathway to land on Saturn's moon Titan on Christmas Eve. The Huygens probe is attached through an electrical umbilical cord to the Cassini spacecraft and has been hibertanting most of the time and only occasionally woken up for a 3 hour system checks every 6 months or so during the 7 year trip to Saturn. The interesting thing is that even when the probe has been released it will still be in sleep mode until January 14th just before it reaches the upper atmosphere of Titan when it will be woken up. Another exciting feature is that both the Cassini delivery space craft and the probe are on a collision course with Titan, but once the probe has been released the Cassini spaceraft will change it's trajectory (direction) on the 27th of December so it does not crash itself into Titan and make sure it is in the right orbit to have a good radio communication link up. |
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