9P/Tempel 1Target of NASA's Deep Impact impactor (2005)
Comet Tempel 1
9P/Tempel 1 is a small Jupiter-family periodic comet, with a roughly 6 km (3.7 mi) nucleus, that orbits the Sun every 5.56 years. On July 4, 2005, NASA's Deep Impact mission fired an 820 lb (372 kg) copper impactor into it at about 23,000 mph, making it the first spacecraft to eject material from a comet's surface and excavating a crater roughly 150 m across. The comet was revisited in 2011 by the Stardust-NExT spacecraft, which imaged the impact site, making Tempel 1 the first comet visited by two missions.
- Designation
- 9P/Tempel 1
- Type
- Spacecraft target
- Orbital period
- 5.56 years
- Discovery
- Wilhelm Tempel, April 3, 1867
