Talking about A hit, a very palpable hit

Kaan, over at The Consigliere blog, has been watching NASA live TV, and witnessed the moment when the Deep Impact mission achieved one of its major aims: to hit the Tempel 1 comet.

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A hit, a very palpable hit

Deep Impact has just hit Tempel 1 about 30 seconds ago. Been following it on NASA live TV. The TV camera was on the controllers and not on the actual image of the impact as it occurred. So I was looking at everyone getting really exited about the something off screen, making me yell out at the camera guy to turn his camera to the right.

A lot of jumping up and down and clapping and screaming going on in the control room.

Impactor team are wearing red t-shirts and Flyby team in blue

Someone just commented that ‘wow, and we were expecting something subtle!”

Finally, they are replaying the actual image of the impact

Wow. That was pretty huge.

Someone, possibly the mission manager, said  “Ok folks we have another vehicle to worry about, so let’s settle down.”

No one is settling down.

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The BBC also reports on the success of the mission here. When it occurred (05:50 GMT) I was safely tucked up in bed. I’m getting old – when men first landed on the moon, I had dragged the TV into my bedroom and eagerly watched the landing from the comfort of my bed – I was too excited to sleep.  

Still, now I can follow the analysis of Deep Impact on the NASA site. And I see that someone has got a sense of humour – headed toward the light, indeed!