This file picture released by the European Space Agency on December 20, 2013 of an artists impression of Rosetta's lander Philae on the surface of comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko. Europe's comet lander Philae has woken up overnight after a months-long sleep.(Photo: MEDIALIAB, AFP/Getty Images)
The European Space Agency's probe Philae has woken up and contacted Earth after about seven months in hibernation, the organization said Sunday.
It said the European Space Operations Center in Darmstadt, Germany, received signals from the lander late Saturday.
Scientists lost connection with the solar-powered probe after it was dropped on comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko by its mothership Rosetta on Nov. 15.
Philae's battery ran out of around 60 hours after it landed next to a cliff that largely blocked sunlight from reaching its solar panels.
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"Philae is doing very well: It has an operating temperature of -35ºC (-31ºF) and has 24 Watts available," said Stephan Ulamec, Philae project manager at the German Aerospace Center (DLR). "The lander is ready for operations."
A post on the Rosetta blog on the The European Space Agency's (ESA) website said that Philae "spoke" with its team on ground via Rosetta for 85 seconds in its first contact since November.
The post said during analysis of the status data, it became clear that Philae must have been awake before, and that the scientists are waiting for it to make contact again.
"There are still more than 8000 data packets in Philae's mass memory which will give the DLR team information on what happened to the lander in the past few days on Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko," the blog post said.
At about 6,45 a.m. ET Philae, which has amassed more than 360,000 Twitter followers,
tweeted: "Hello @ESA_Rosetta! I'm awake! How long have I been asleep? #Lifeonacomet"
Perfect Sciencereported Sunday that Philae is approximately 190 million miles from the Earth and around 135 million miles from the Sun.
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