We were glued to the tube for this one the other night as well. Absolutely mindboggling that they could nail that thing with something the size of a washing machine that far away from Earth. Very "Hollywood-esque", for sure. I was just praying that they wouldn't accidentally knock the think ON COURSE with the Earth, but I heard them address that later on, saying they'd taken that into consideration, and that there was no possibility of that happening, thank God.
So Dale, when do they start determining the makeup of the comet? And are they really just going to attempt to do that solely based on photographic reference, or is the orbiter probe thingee collecting any fragments or samples as well?