NEW YORK: A comet-chasing space probe that has been in hibernation for almost three years has woken up and sent its first signal back to Earth.
The European Space Agency received the all-clear message “Hello World!” from its Rosetta spacecraft some 500 million miles away shortly after 1 p.m. EST, Monday.
Rosetta was put into hibernation in 2011 to conserve energy for its long journey to meet with comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko.
If all goes as planned the probe will rendezvous with the comet in the coming months and drop a lander onto its icy surface in November.
