June 30th, 2015

Only a few days after Philae's unexpected reawakening, the mission has been extended for a further nine months, up until September 2016

ESA has officially confirmed the extension of the Rosettamission up until the end of September next year. The news, eagerly awaited by the scientific community, arrived only a few days after the unexpected awakening of the Philae lander,which landed on the surface of comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko on 12 November last year.
The mission's "nominal" end was originally scheduled forDecember 2015, but ESA's Science Programme Committee(SPC) met this morning to formally approve the nine month extension - running up to the time when the probe's instruments will no longer receive sufficient energy from the Sun
ASI President Roberto Battiston commented that: "This is wonderful news for science and for Italy, which has given and continues to give a huge contribution to this mission”, continuing by saying "This extension will give added potential to what remains an historical mission in the exploration of our solar system".
As Enrico Flamini, Chief Scientist at ASI, emphasised, "The excellence and exceptional results achieved by Philae and the Rosetta mission made it easy to decide to extend it nine months beyond its planned lifetime. This way, we will also be able to observe the phase as the comet moves away from the Sun after the perihelion. This is a unique and unmissable opportunity to study the evolution of a comet from its dormant phase, when it is a long way away from the Sun, through its activation all the way to its decline in activities as it returns to the cold, outer regions of the solar system".
“This is fantastic news,” confirmed Matt Taylor, ESA’s Rosetta Project Scientist. “We’ll be able to monitor the decline in the comet’s activity as we move away from the Sun again, and we’ll have the opportunity to fly closer to the comet to continue collecting more unique data.”
67P will make its closest approach to the Sun on 13 August, after which it will be possible to gradually move the probe nearer to the comet's nucleus, taking new measurements to compare to those taken before the summer as well as possibly allowing for precise identification of the lander.
The comet will then move to the same position as in June 2011, when the distance from the Sun caused the onboard instruments to be placed into hibernation for 31 months.
"At that point, however," explained Patrick Martin, Rosetta Mission Manager, "the most logical way to end the mission is to set Rosetta down on the surface of the comet".