人类探测器首次登陆彗星

An unmanned probe touched down on a comet for the first time on Wednesday, as the European Space Agency’s Philae lander successfully negotiated a perilous seven-hour descent from its Rosetta mother ship on to the irregular nucleus of Comet 67P.

一个无人驾驶的探测器周三首次在一颗彗星表面着陆，欧洲航天局(European Space Agency)的飞来号(Philae)着陆器成功与母船罗塞塔号(Rosetta)分离，在危险中下降了7个小时，最终在彗星67P的不规则中心着陆。

Scientists at ESA mission headquarters erupted in applause shortly after 4pm GMT as a radio signal from Philae 511m km away confirmed that the washing-machine-sized probe had reached the surface.

在格林威治时间周三下午4点后不久，欧洲航天局任务总部的科学家们爆发出热烈掌声，“飞来号”从距离地球5.11亿公里的地方发来的一个无线信号证实，这个洗衣机大小的探测器已在彗星表面着陆。

“The lander is talking to us,” said an emotional Stephan Ulamec, Philae manager, after the first signal came through. “We are extremely relieved to be safely on the surface of the comet, especially given the extra challenge of the comet’s unusual shape and unexpectedly hazardous surface,” he added. “In the next hours we’ll learn exactly where and how we’ve landed, and we’ll start getting as much science as we can from the surface of this fascinating world.”

“着陆器在跟我们说话，”“飞来号”主管史蒂芬•乌拉美克(Stephan Ulamec)在第一个信号传来后激动的表示，“得知着陆器已安全抵达彗星表面，我们彻底松了一口气，特别是在这颗彗星的形状不同寻常且表面意外危险的情况下，”他补充称：“未来几个小时，我们将搞清楚它是在哪里着陆以及如何着陆的，我们将开始从这个迷人世界的表面获得尽可能多的科学数据。”

Philae separated from Rosetta at 9am on Wednesday morning. ESA scientists had dubbed Philae’s descent to the comet “seven hours of terror” – an echo of the “seven minutes of terror” endured by their Nasa counterparts before the successful landing of the Curiosity rover on Mars in 2012.

“飞来号”是在周三早晨9点与罗塞塔号分离的。欧洲航天局的科学家们将“飞来号”下降抵达彗星的过程称为“恐怖7小时”，这与美国国家航空航天局(Nasa)在2012年“好奇号”(Curiosity)探测器在火星成功着陆之前经历的“恐怖7分钟”形成呼应。

If anything, the Philae landing was even more perilous. While Curiosity dropped on to a relatively smooth Martian surface, Philae landed on a duck-shaped lump of ice, dust and rock just 4km wide, strewn with boulders and shooting out unpredictable jets of gas.

“飞来号”的着陆更加危险。“好奇号”是在相对平滑的火星表面着陆的，而“飞来号”则是降落在一块鸭子形状、由冰、尘埃和岩石组成的块状物上，只有4公里宽，周围散布着巨石，而且喷射出无法预测的气流。

Before the landing, mission managers said anchoring would be needed because 67P’s gravitational pull is too weak to hold Philae firmly in place. After touchdown they discovered that Philae had landed without its harpoons firing successfully.

在着陆前，此次飞行任务的主管们表示，着陆器需要固定，因为彗星67P的引力太小，无法让“飞来号”紧紧固定。在着陆后，他们发现，“飞来号”是在没有成功发射鱼叉的情况下着陆的。

Philae will start scientific investigations of the comet immediately. Various instruments will look at the physics and chemistry of the surface, while drills extract subsurface samples and deliver them to the probe’s onboard laboratory for further analysis.

“飞来号”将立即展开科学调查。各种工具将考察彗星表面的物理和化学结构，同时钻头将提取地表下样本，并将它们送至探测器的机载实验室，进行进一步分析。

Scientists are looking forward eagerly to the results because cometary material is believed to have changed little since the formation of the solar system 4.5bn years ago.

科学家们正热情期待着这些结果，因为据信，自太阳系于4亿年前形成以来，彗星物质几乎没有发生变化。

Although the initial science phase will last for just three days – the lifetime of Philae’s primary batteries – mission scientists hope its solar panels will enable it to study the change in conditions for a few months as it approaches the sun, heating up and becoming ever more active.

尽管最初的科学考察期仅会持续3天（“飞来号”主电池的寿命），但此次任务的科学家们希望探测器上的太阳能电池板能够让探测器在未来几个月，在彗星接近太阳、燃烧以及变得更为活跃时考察其状态的变化。

“Rosetta is trying to answer the very big questions about the history of our Solar System,” said Matt Taylor, Rosetta project scientist. “What were the conditions like at its infancy and how did it evolve? What role did comets play in this evolution? How do comets work?”

“罗塞塔号正试图解答有关我们太阳系的一些非常重要的问题，”罗塞塔号项目科学家马特•泰勒(Matt Taylor)表示，“在太阳系形成初期它是什么状态？它是如何进化的？彗星在这种进化中起到了什么作用？彗星如何运转？”