How Cool Is This?

I’ve been following the progress of the Philae lander this week with all of the excitement I felt as a kid when the Space Shuttle launched for the first time.  When you think about it, this is quite an accomplishment of science and physics.  This little craft – Rosetta – needed two flybys of Earth and Mars to build up enough speed just to zip along next to the comet.  Now we’ve landed a robotic probe on the surface.

Because I’m always curious about this sort of thing, I sifted through the internet for any pictures I could find from the surface.  I found one but it was small and had text pasted over it, so I’m still looking.  All indications point to a really alien-looking piece of terrain.

In the meantime, I did find this interesting graphic that shows a size comparison between the comet and Los Angeles:

I have to admit after a brief visit to Southern California that this appears to be the best place to park the comet if we could place it gently on the Earth.  Might fix the smog problem.

Of course, being the die-hard Trekkie that I am, I had to grab this comparison chart, just in case:

Enjoy.  If anyone finds a good, clear set of comet surface pictures, please drop a link!