Europe’s Mars orbiter and its scientific instruments will have a front-row seat on Sunday when Comet Siding Spring grazes the Red Planet, skimming past at a little more than a third of the Moon’s distance from Earth.
Mars Express in orbit around Mars. Credit: ESA/AOES Medialab
Comet Siding Spring, discovered in January 2013, is less than a kilometre across and will pass Mars at 56 km/s, closing to within 139 500 km at 18:27 GMT (20:27 CEST) on 19 October.
Read full article in the main ESA website here.
Updates will be posted here in the Mars Express blog and a webcast from ESA’s Space Operations Centre, ESOC, in Darmstadt, Germany, will be streamed live 19 October, starting at 17:50 GMT (19:50 CEST).
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