Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko, the comet Rosetta mission's Philae lander alighted upon in November 2014 is a sweaty beast. Well, it's throwing up water.
Every second, the 2.5-mile-wide comet is pouring out 40 ounces of water, according to observations made by NASA's Microwave Instrument for Rosetta Orbiter (MIRO), which is on board the European Space Agency's Rosetta spacecraft.
Results of the observations were released on Thursday in the journal Science which is released by American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS).
"In observations over a period of three months [June through August, 2014], the amount of water in vapor form that the comet was dumping into space grew about tenfold," said lead author Sam Gulkis, principal investigator of the MIRO instrument at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, according to NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL). "To be up close and personal with a comet for an extended period of time has provided us with an unprecedented opportunity to see how comets transform from cold, icy bodies to active objects spewing out gas and dust as they get closer to the sun."
"That situation may be changing now that the comet is getting warmer," said Gulkis. "MIRO observations would need to be carefully analyzed to determine which factors in addition to the sun's warmth are responsible for the cometary outgassing."
