3 ms·

pure speculating here... Perhaps the lander could land on the front of it. Ie, it is moving just a little bit slower than the comet, and uses the differential

pure speculating here... Perhaps the lander could land on the front of it. Ie, it is moving just a little bit slower than the comet, and uses the differential speed as a "artificial" gravity for the landing.

gus_massa 13y ago
You don’t need to land in the front. For the sake of simplicity let’s assume that your “ship” is very near (a few miles?) the comet (or asteroid). Fist, you must use the engines to travel at the same velocity than the comet, in the same direction. And let’s assume that nearby there is an automatic camera in another spaceship that also travel with the same velocity (because you must upload the video to YouTube to gain founds). The Sun’s gravity affect the three object equally, so you can “cancel” it, i.e. from the camera point of view, there is no gravity and the object just float around. (The technical term is no-inertial reference frame.) It’s like the videos from the ISS, there is gravity, but the ISS is falling as fast as the astronaut, so it looks like there is no gravity. (There are a little tidal force, because all the object are at different distance from the Sun, so you must add a little corrections.) It’s not necessary that your ship goes at the same speed. It moves like there is no gravity if you see that from the asteroid point of view, or from the magical camera point of view. This approximation is useful when the ship is near the comet. So you can land as if there is no gravity. (With your ship in front of the comet and going slightly slowly in Sun’s reference frame, or with your ship in back of the comet and going slightly faster in Sun’s reference frame, or on one side ...) I still have more questions: The comet is probably rotating? How fast? Is that a problem? The comet produces jets that create the tail. These jets can modify the comet speed. Is that a problem? Are they dangerous?

gus_massa 13y ago

You don’t need to land in the front. For the sake of simplicity let’s assume that your “ship” is very near (a few miles?) the comet (or asteroid). Fist, you must use the engines to travel at the same velocity than the comet, in the same direction. And let’s assume that nearby there is an automatic camera in another spaceship that also travel with the same velocity (because you must upload the video to YouTube to gain founds). The Sun’s gravity affect the three object equally, so you can “cancel” it, i.e. from the camera point of view, there is no gravity and the object just float around. (The technical term is no-inertial reference frame.) It’s like the videos from the ISS, there is gravity, but the ISS is falling as fast as the astronaut, so it looks like there is no gravity. (There are a little tidal force, because all the object are at different distance from the Sun, so you must add a little corrections.) It’s not necessary that your ship goes at the same speed. It moves like there is no gravity if you see that from the asteroid point of view, or from the magical camera point of view. This approximation is useful when the ship is near the comet. So you can land as if there is no gravity. (With your ship in front of the comet and going slightly slowly in Sun’s reference frame, or with your ship in back of the comet and going slightly faster in Sun’s reference frame, or on one side ...) I still have more questions: The comet is probably rotating? How fast? Is that a problem? The comet produces jets that create the tail. These jets can modify the comet speed. Is that a problem? Are they dangerous?