harpon d'ancrage

CONT: Le premier module, baptisé LAL [Sigle de Long-Term Automatic Lander. En français, Sonde Automatique de Longue Durée.], était conçu pour s'ancrer dans le sol grâce à une sorte de harpon d'ancrage, appelé Razrez par les soviétiques.

CONT: From its close orbit above the tiny nucleus, Rosetta will be able to send back the most detailed images and information ever obtained of a comet. When a suitable landing site has been chosen, about a month after global mapping starts, the orbiter will release a 100 kg lander onto the comet's solid surface. Touchdown must be quite slow - less than one metre per second - to allow for the almost negligible gravitational pull of the tiny nucleus. In order to ensure that the lander does not bounce and disappear into space, an anchoring harpoon will be fired into the surface immediately on impact.
CONT: Penetrators as tools for exploring extraterrestrial solid surfaces have been developed for a couple of space missions to Mars, the Moon, comets, and the icy satellites of the giant planets. They are particularly useful to characterize the strength properties and the layering of planetary nearsurface layers. Being currently engaged with the development of an instrumented ""anchoring harpoon"" for the lander of ESA's comet mission Rosetta, we propose similar devices for application aboard future Mars lander missions.