European Rosetta Probe Flies Past Mars

The European spaceship, Rosetta, flew across Mars today morning (2:00-2:40) GMT.
It took many pictures of the planet including pictures of the far side of the planet. The scary part was when Rosetta disappeared from Mission Control for twenty five minutes, when it flew on the opposite part of the planet. Mars, causing an eclipse, forced the probe to switch to battery power, instead of solar. The probe was not built to run on battery power, and Mission Control was afraid of it loosing power. The battery was for stability after take off. This probe costs about 1.3 billion US dollars. (1 billion euros). The probe is scheduled to come back to Europe in November of 2014. Head spokesmen of ESA (European Space Agency) say that the fly past Mars was the most delicate part of the flight after take off, afraid that if it didn't fly carefully, it might be sucked in with Mars's gravitational pull. Rosetta is actually built to follow comets. After coming back in November, it will go on another mission in 2014. Rosetta is planned to fly 7.1 billion kilometers. The probe is hoped to help answer the question of where life began and if life really exists on other planets and celestial bodies. Hopefully all will go well in this mission and the ESA will help NASA with their missions!
My article: http://www.dw-world.de/dw/article/0,2144,2363878,00.html

picture from: www.photobcuket.com/sapphirestar1710