I had an accidental eruption once but mom said it was perfectly normal and I shouldn't feel embarrassed about it.

I was one of the engineers that helped build, test, launch and operate Deep Impact. I was the Launch Conductor on Launch Day and a member of the mission operations team at JPL. At JPL I performed duties of Navigation Team Member, Activity Lead, Flight Director, and the Impactor Command and Data Handling subsystem Engineer during the encounter. Coincidentally - I left Lockheed Martin in 2000 specifically to work on Deep Impact. At Lockheed Martin I helped with Mars Global Surveyor, *Stardust* , and Genesis. So, while it was a let down missing the image of the crater with the DI Flyby HRI Instrument (the "Primary Science" of DI), it was going to be my OTHER Trusty spacecraft to come along and get the image. It was especially important because the images that stardust took were through the Instrument that I was personally responsible for and integrated onto the Stardust Spacecraft, the "Navigation Camera". It was some leftover parts of a Voyager flight Camera with a Cassini CCD in place of the old phot-multiplier tube.

Alternate Title: That Time NASA Punched A Comet Really Hard for Science

"The image NASA didn't want to receive." "This is bad." Are the clickbait titles really necessary? Do you really think people would not be interested in comets otherwise?

Great video and educational... but I have one question. What was the image that NASA didn't want to receive from the Deep Impact Probe?

This was utterly enthralling and quietly mind-blowing. The precision required to do any of this is incredible and the findings are fundamental. Thanks for bringing these projects to a wider audience

My admiration for the people behind these missions is unbounded. So much respect for the work involved and the learnings from it.

Hi Alex. I know you realise how unbelievably important your productions are but id like to give you from my point of view why they are so. Im a late 40 year old, spent most of my life wt sea and am well travelled. I speak 7 languages but one language i cannot get my head round is the language of space. I dont understand space and the universe at all. You manage to bring all of that noise thrown at the general populous of the earth and turn it into something understandable and bring it alive. Believe it or not your videos have even brought my own life more interesting, things i see here on earth now take on a whole new meaning. Now when im at sea looking up at the stars, i now hive a small understanding of what is going on above me. So thank you. Dont give nupnmaking them.

I watched the live report of Giotto's fly-by of Halley's comet as a kid and was riveted to the screen and commentary. I spent 3 weeks tracking Halley's across the night sky, and though it wasn't particularly visually spectacular, I was hooked on astronomy. Hale/Bopp gave me that stunning majesty I always expected of a comet to the unaided eye. I was bowled over by it's gorgeous beauty and would stare at it for hours. When I pointed it out to my girlfriend in the clear air of a mountain top, her eyes were like saucers and she was almost speechless.

Fantastic. Spot on! I worked on the DI spacecraft flight software from proposal to end of mission. Temple 1 impact and Hartley-2 flyby. I was at JPL for all mission ops. Best time of my life. Such a great team, great mission and great science. Thank you for this superb video.

The math and calculations needed to perform such tasks is beyond amazing. What a feat! Thank you for this fascinating presentation.

love how practical the mission is, but meaningful and brings a lot of feedback. its a small feat but an achievment still, now we can crecreate accurate simulations of impact craters etc

I've known only a few scientists in my 70 years. I am referring not just to folks who have degrees but people who actually who ask good questions and go about answering them with discipline and dedication. They seem driven to me. In fact I asked one "Why did you become a scientist?" and the answer was, "I never had a choice. I count myself very fortunate to have known my life's direction. I knew what I was going to do." And so he went on to educate himself and holds a few patents, published papers. Listening to this... Astrum reminded me of this. And I'm willing to bet that if we asked him why he makes these videos his answer would be close to "I never had a choice."

No matter how far technology progresses, mathematical laws remain. It’s actually incredible what has been achieved using the study of trajectories and the dedication and money that goes into each of these missions.

As much as I am not a math guy, I find beauty in the accuracy, precision and stunning amount of work that must have went into such a project and goal. To be this precise twice in a row. Kudos to the scientists that achieved this for all to see.

I like your stuff but I can’t stay bc of the fearmongering clickbait titles :/

I’ve been recommending you to people I know who aren’t particularly familiar or very interested in these subjects by describing you as the David Attenborough of the Solar System. I use this comparison because just like Attenborough you bring forth the wonder and complexities of the natural world to the masses in such a marvellously detailed way. It’s digestible and enthralling. And once again similar to David Attenborough you are completely unique in the way you convey and portray the information on the subject. I screen recorded this intro to this video to give them an idea because of how beautifully you put into perspective our historical interpretations of comets to our current capabilities to explore and interact with the seemingly unobtainable aspects of the sky above us. It was truely inspirational to me and the people in my life I try to share your channel with. Thank you for your passion and efforts. I’ve been on this channel back in the early days when you began your planetary solar system videos and it’s wonderful to see your growth and success, it’s well deserved! Thank you and thank you again and again.

Astrum, your attention to detail is on another level. Another brilliant video! In a world full of TikTok and KZfaq short videos. It's hard to keep people captived and watching for 30 minutes. Yet, you manage to do that, thank you! Always looking forward to the next video!

Thank you Alex for not only being precise in relaying your research, not only your researching efforts but being impeccably well spoken in imparting it.

I remember Halley’s Comet in the 1980’s. we live in Marin County in Northern California, just over the Go,den Gate Bridge from San Francisco. Because the air is fresh and right off the Pacific, the nights are carpets of stars. For a week or so back then, Halley’s Comet hung in our western sky, silent, seemingly fixed, but actually moving lower and lower every night, on the western horizon. It was beautiful. On one hand, it was technical and scientific display, covered in the local media and television; on the other, and awe inspiring demonstration of what our ancestors had seen… a silent messenger in the heavens. Thanks for this videp.

One of the best presentations on cometary missions, Thanks for the excellent production

I’ve been watching this channel for years, it’s just the best. Always a good day when a long episode is out. Appreciate it dude

Damn, that little bit about Stardust restin at the end made me a little emotional. feeling feels over a satellite. wild.

The music in this video is by Stellardrone. The track being played is Eternity. Probably one of the best bits of spacemusic ever created.

I'd hit the character limit before I could properly say how good this is.

Love your deep dive videos about past space missions. Keep it up! Also, I've been watching your channel for years then checked it now. Wow, you're raking in millions of views. Well deserved for such high quality content. Glad the effort paid off

So I just realized that whenever I thought of rocket science, I assumed it was just the building of them, which while impressive, isn't something I'd consider the hardest thing in the world. But this video shows that rocket scientists also are able to calculate orbits and gravity on such a monumental scale, that I now understand why it's the hardest thing....

That video was amazing! I was always interested in space and space missions but had missed a lot of last years missions about comets to be exact! I learned more from this video that I hadn't exactly undrstood for many years....extremely well written and edited, very informative about the finer details, and gives a wonderfull view on our Solar System's comets! Many thanks for posting this great video, thanks!

*It's mind-blowing to see the precision and attention to detail required for such a mission. Hats off to the team behind it! Your videos never disappoint, always informative and captivating.* 👍👍👍

Wish I could live long enough to really know what's going on in our universe.

Nasa keeping old satellites around is basically a scaled up version of that block of wood that has been in my garage since 2006

I remember watching Hale-Bopp in the nightsky as a kid. It was marvelous and magical. Amazing documentation as always Alex.

I remember Hale-Bopp in 1997. What a spectacular sight. I walked around with my binoculars and showed so many people. Most did not even realise it was there. Every one of them was awestruck though. You did not need binoculars though as you could see it with ease, but with them it was out of this world.

I remember the palpable excitement among our amateur (independent?) astronomy club when Deep Impact was about to happen, and some of them were able to actually see a bit of the show. I was busy with the family for the holiday. I'm not bitter though... ;-)

Bravo to whoever did the math for Stardust and Stardust NeXT! I'm impressed.

The way we have made such precise plans and accomplishments in space exploration shows that anything is possible in our endevors.

What incredible science and engineering, it’s a pity missions like this are often forgotten instead of the mistakes such as Mars pathfinder

24:17 holy moly, calculating the alignment of the Temple 1 just from the brightness spikes years ahead to meet with Stardust NExT is so scifi!

"Let's crash into the sunny side so there is better lighting for our pictures" Then the sunlight on the crater heats the newly exposed ice enough causing the ice to melt and evaporate, creating a cloud of gas and dust so they couldn't see the crater at all. They are some of the smartest people on Earth. They can design, build, and send a probe to a small comet. But they overlooked the simple things. They didn't think about the effect of sunlight and heat on the ice inside the comet. The reason comets have tails. That sounds about right.

As always, what a great video! I enjoy listening to all the great scientific facts that I didn’t know about as well as your calming voice.

With most channels, anytime they post a 30 minute video, I eventually struggle to stay interested and often catch myself fast-forwarding through parts of it to avoid losing interest altogether. That being said, that's definitely not the case with this channel; The content is great and easy to get into, and never once have I lost focus in any of his videos.

Thanks for this deep dive into an incredible mission.

The mathematical precision is mind-boggling.

Think maybe you could post in the description a timestamp for where you start talking about the actual topic that's in the title of the video??? I will say this video is a nice 30 minute piece on the history of space flights, sattelites, comets, outer space and more. I'd just like the 30-second piece of video telling what the image NASA didn't want to see is.

this was one of your best episodes, really good! subscribed a while back and glad i did!

excellent video breakdown! i don’t particularly recall this entire multi-purposed mission (life was crazy back then), but wow! i also was able to do the quick calculations from your Halley’s comet date from my childhood: if i’m lucky, i might be witness to a 2nd flyby Halley’s comet at the (horrifying) age of 86! either way, at least i saw it once in my lifetime! thank you!

Excellent ! ❤ Our fallen explorer is still wandering the stars representing our collective efforts and we are proud and sad at the same time.

This was fantastic, thank you for this! Those folks at NASA have done such amazingly precise work.

Deep Impact was a NASA space probe launched from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station on January 12, 2005. It was designed to study the interior composition of the comet Tempel 1 (9P/Tempel), by releasing an impactor into the comet. At 05:52 UTC on July 4, 2005, the Impactor successfully collided with the comet's nucleus. The impact excavated debris from the interior of the nucleus, forming an impact crater. Photographs taken by the spacecraft showed the comet to be more dusty and less icy than had been expected. The impact generated an unexpectedly large and bright dust cloud, obscuring the view of the impact crater. Man this event was almost 18 years ago !!

My name was on that CD !! Thank you for covering this !

I love your breakdown of the history of aerogel and the instrument designed with it on Stardust! Truly remarkable engineering and mathematics! ❤

I noticed that the narration from 11:07 to 20:58 is lifted basically word-for-word from the 2022 NewsBreak article "Stardust's surprising discovery by NASA" attributed to 'Science & Technology.' I did not see any mention of this article in the credits, description, or video. I was curious if you are affiliated with NewsBreak, as the website claims it is their original property over a year before this video. Cheers! Edit: After looking further, I recognize that I failed to realize that this is a Supercut. Your original video containing this information actually predates the aforementioned article by 6 months. It appears they potentially lifted your original narration and used it to generate an article?

This was one of your best reports on probes to celestial bodies. I enjoyed it

Calculate the rotation of the comet to make a precision photo, that was absolute insane!!!!! Wonderful video!!! Spectacular NASA!!

Excellent production. So complete and so educational. Thanks Alex

Amazing report, many thanks. very well researched, produced and delivered.

You add so much value to my life Alex. Thank you for making Astrum. Life changing. Seriously. This channel is beautiful, elegant, and a wonderful experience

Im absolutely fascinated by asteroid & comet discovery/visitation missions. So much to be learned about them and the very fundamentals of our solar system. And we often only learn about the more "mainstream" missions to the planetary bodies, when imo, these can be just as interesting, if not more so! Here's to another *century* of blasting probes into asteroids and comets!

Thanks Alex for the great video as always! I think that even with all the knowledge we have about comets they are still extremely fascinating objects. Even more fascinating then before I think. One thing that still can be true about Oort cloud objects is, that there have to be some asteroids that basically just stay there and never visit the Sun, so maybe those could have lots of answers for the scientists about the origins of our solar system.

There was no muddy snowball. The hydroxyl ions and hydrogen ions are expelled from the comet by EDM, Electrical Discharge Machining into a cloud in which a percentage of them combine to form water. The finding of organic compounds is huge. Those missions were brilliantly planned and carried out, however; the interpretations of the results have been weighed, measured, and found wanting.

This was really great stuff! You're an excellent story teller! Kept me riveted to the unfolding tale of two comet probes....

It's weird that no one seemed to foresee that the ejected dust from the impactor might obscure the orbiter's view of the crater.

Impressed by these clips, they are easy to follow and very intersting!

I don't know why I always cry about the little machines we send to the stars doing their very best until their very last

Comet Wild 2 was discovered by Paul Wild on Jan. 6, 1978. Overview. 81P/Wild (Wild 2) (Wild is pronounced vilt) if anyone else was curious why it was pronounced that way in the video

Another great video with attention to so many details. Adding to the material is your presentation of the commentary. Such a refreshing change from so many AI-generated commentary that use door punctuation and grammar as the source. Thank you.

This is one of the coolest things I've ever seen. Just fascinating and so well done. Great work with the video and hats off to the brilliant people working at NASA. What an awesome job that would be.

I personally believe Deep Impact’s sign off should have read "Goodbye Earth, Hello Universe!".

I love videos like this! Such interesting subjects, and such reverence and interest shown for the subject matter!

Incredible engineering achievements! -Great video and nice narration too!

This video is worth my subscription. Grade A Content

Thank you for using your real voice in a day of computers mispronouncing everything.

that was awesome thanks !! Maybe these kind of missions could also bring back other unknown stuff to earth. And that is truly fascinating.

Phenomenal as always! Thank you :)

The ability of these scientists to do the things they did on space exploration is mind boggling.

Rest well, brave probes! You achieved great things in your brief time.

"It will no longer be so mysterious or foreboding. They may even be the reason you're here today. And all it took to learn this was to catch the dust from one, and to punch another really, really hard." What I heard is "To get the answers they demand. Humans are literally doing enhanced interrogation of celestial bodies." Yeah, I'm thinking based.

I’m at UMD and one of my closest mentors was deputy PI on Deep Impact. The naming of the movie and mission was indeed a coincidence and kind of caused a few minor nightmares 😂

Thank you for this most informative Video. Thank you to all members of the Deep Impact Project.

R.I.P. Startdust-NExT. Thank you for all your hard work.

Working at one of the telescopes on Mauna Kea (from the office, not from the mountain) I may have been the last one to find out whether Deep Impact actually hit. I was just there to make sure that we could observe what actually happened, not to observe it. I only found out when I left the office that people at a neighboring office were cheering.

1:24 the exact moment we avenged the Dinosaurs. Titles like with this video tend to be clckbait, but I always look who uploaded before clicking and when I see Astrum I tend to think it probably isn't that much clickbait as it seems to be. Always love your videos and learned a lot over the years watching you.

For everyone who doesn’t understand, the title is NOT clickbait. The original photographs taken were not obtainable due to the dust buildup on the camera.

Awesome video and very well done!

Well, that was just... AWESOME!!! Thank you for this video Astrum.

This channel is just outstanding. Woulda been a top PBS show back then...

I can see one of the engineers, in a dive bar, over hearing a group of bikers talking about how they broke bones, put guys in hospitals, and other "tough" stuff. Then the engineer stifles a chuckle, which gets their attention. Bikers,"You think we're a joke? You don't even look like you could break a pencil, let alone anyone's face." and they laugh. The engineer swings around on his barstool and says, "Ya I do. All I heard were stories of you busting guys up. Honestly, child's play." One biker then said, "Ok tough guy, what have you done that's so badass?" The engineer finishes off his drink, swirls the ice in the glass, looks down for a second, then slowly looks up to make eye contact to say, "I punched a comet in the face and made it explode." The bikers go silent and turn away, and quietly drink their beers.

Nice, most of these things on KZfaq are full of repeating fluff (not the aerogel kind). I appreciate your approach to reporting real science.

Recovering the aerogel detector was so important, that they gave it its own re-entry module.

19:26 except for the failure in the parachute that caused it to "crash into the desert, not land.

10:10Dust cloud such a surprise - SHOCKING! Jacques Pickard & partner went down in 1962 to the Challenger Deep; impact raised an obscuring cloud. 40+ years later, *what did they expect!!??*

Not sure about the hypothesis that these comets come from our solar system. Just because their analysis indicated similar or even identical chemical makeup of our own solar system does not mean it had to originate here. Why is it that a different solar system from our own could not have an identical composition? Of course, I lack the data required to answer these questions so my queries are simply of a logical nature. Regardless, the video was most informative and a pleasure to observe. Thank you.

Im sure this will be a great video.. thanx alex..💪💪👍👌

Him: "Now it finally rests among the stars." Me: 😭😭😭😭

I'm really glad I subscribed to this channel it's very interesting I love listening to all this information😊

Stardust's final message: "Tell my wife I love her very much, she knows."

7:34 is where this video starts

NEOWISE was my first comet to observe

Imagine getting two grains of sand, spinning around in a large stadium, to hit each other. Now imagine it is much much much harder that this.

You have fantastic narration and research. Subscribed!