Video: Lander manager provides update on Philae status

Trapped in rough, forbidding terrain with its solar panels draped in shadow, the Philae comet lander raced the clock Friday to carry out high-priority science operations, including an attempt to drill into the surface of the nucleus, before exhausting its on-board batteries and effectively losing consciousness.

The European Philae comet lander, out of power and presumably lost after bouncing into heavily shadowed terrain last November, phoned home Saturday after finally getting enough sunlight on its solar panels to transmit data to the Rosetta orbiter for relay to Earth.

The European Space Agency’s Rosetta mission will end Sept. 30 with a dicey descent to the core of comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko, a risky, but potentially rewarding finale punctuated by commands to automatically safe the probe’s rocket thrusters and turn off its radio transmitter.