Today the ESA Rosetta team will be selecting five candidate landing sites for the Philae lander. They should announce the sites tomorrow. The final site selection comes in October for a landing in November.

The choice of site is determined firstly by the question, is it safe and technically feasible to land at the site. Other factors that will be considered are: can Rosetta stay in contact with Philae at the site, Does it have a mixture of day and night and is the surface interesting scientifically.

There is a short video from the very earliest view of candidate landing sites, they are marked with green ovals. The actual accuracy of landing is no better than 600m. Philae will be unguided and unpowered on the way down.



[link to www.youtube.com (secure)]

Here is the much more complete ESA arcticle on landing site selection.

[link to blogs.esa.int]

K