This morning, the Philae Lander has re-awoken from its hibernation on Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko, according to a blog post from the European Space Agency.
The lander has been in hibernation mode since November, after coming to rest in a shady part of the comet’s surface. Now, with the comet closer to the sun, scientists were hoping that it would begin to pick up more sunlight.
The signals were received at ESA’s European Space Operations Centre in Darmstadt at 22:28 CEST on 13 June. More than 300 data packets have been analysed by the teams at the Lander Control Center at the German Aerospace Center (DLR).
Now that that’s the lander is awake, ground control is hoping that it will be able to transmit any other data it has in its memory.