The MUSC in Cologne houses the Lander Control Center (LCC). Supported by their scientific partner (SONC) at CNES in Toulouse, the PHILAE team at LCC was responsible for the control and operation of the Lander. Commands were sent from the LCC to the European control center ESOC in Darmstadt, from where they are forwarded to the new ESA Deep Space Ground Station in New Norcia (Australia) or Malargüe (Argentina) which then transmits them to ROSETTA. Given the distance of ROSETTA from Earth, signal propagation delays can exceed half an hour (one direction). Reception of telemetry happens in reverse order. The operations team, engineers and scientists have monitored and analysed data from their instruments through the MUSC-provided data systems and control mechanisms. Following a successful and precise launch from the European space port in Kourou, French Guyana on 2nd March 2004, the first years of the mission were dominated by intense testing: Subsystems and experiments of both the orbiter as well as the lander are checked and their flight characteristics determined.

The Lander Control Center hosts further facilities supporting operations of the Lander. A functionally identical ground model of Philae allowed for the testing of planned function sequences and verification of automated procedures. A complex software simulator of the Lander could simulate specific system states and provided the engineers with an opportunity to optimise software configurations for scientific experiment operations on the comet.


Copyright: ESA/Rosetta/MPS for OSIRIS Team




Copyright: ESA/Rosetta/Philae/CIVAss


Copyright: ESA/Rosetta/Philae/ROLIS/DLR


Copyright: ESA/Rosetta/MPS for OSIRIS Team MPS/UPD/LAM/IAA/SSO/INTA/UPM/DASP/IDA


Copyright: ESA/Rosetta/Philae/CIVA