NASA has formally announced the forced retirement of Deep Impact spacecraft before its follow-on mission to rendezvous with the Comet Ison. In August, contact was lost with the spacecraft after it fell into a spin following a software upload. With not enough illumination of its solar arrays, its batterie power pack apparently discharged. A full investigation is beeing undertaken to confirm the cause of the failure.
Comment by David Todd: NASA’s Deep Impact team has a lot to be proud of. On its original mission Deep Impact spacecraft fired an impactor into Comet P/Tempel 1 in July 2005 and imaged its results. In its extended Epoxi mission, made a fly-by Comet Hartley 2 in November 2010.
