What Does the Moon Have to do with the Deep Impact Mission?
Well, quite a lot actually. Shortly after takeoff, the science team used the spacecraft images of the moon to check the calibrations for their instruments. Here is a Mission Challenge based on their calculations and set to national math standards. Have your students do real mission math! Question: What was the distance from the Deep Impact spacecraft to the moon on January 16, 2005? On January 16, 2005, the Deep Impact spacecraft turned its cameras back toward Earth and captured some beautiful images of our Moon. To aid in calibrating the spacecraft instruments, astronomers would like to know precisely how far Deep Impact was from the moon when this picture was taken. http://deepimpact.jpl.nasa.gov/disczone/challenge_Moon_Distance.cfm Way to go, Stardust! – Return to Sender Congratulations to the Stardust Mission for the safe and successful return of their capsule containing actual particles from comet Wild 2 on January 15, 2006. There was great excitement as their science team viewed
