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Talus Low-G Anchoring System

Landing on a Comet

TALUS LOW-G ANCHORING SYSTEM ESA's Rosetta Mission was a huge success in term of the capability of unmanned exploration. Rosetta was able to orbit and recover an enourmous amount of data from the comet 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko. Unfortunately the Philae Lander that was tasked to land on the comet could not successfully anchor due to thruster failure.

Our goal is to redesign the Philae's anchoring system so that even with thruster failure, the probe would be able to land. This system uses an active rooting system that expels wire outwards to increase the anchor's footprint.

PROBLEM STATEMENT: The failure of the Philae Lander was directly related to the systems inability to properly deploy anchoring measures and overcome the impulse under the given environmental conditions.

Our design should be able to deploy within a reasonable amount of time without deflecting the entire lander into a position that prohibits normal functions while simultaneously achieving a “reliable" anchor.