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Deep Impact was a NASA space probe launched from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station on January 12, 2005. It was designed to study the interior composition of the comet Tempel 1 (9P/Tempel), by releasing an impactor into the comet. On July 4, 2005, the impactor successfully collided with the comet's nucleus. The impact excavated debris from the interior of the nucleus, forming an impact crater.
Deep Impact embarked on an extended mission designated EPOXI (Extrasolar Planet Observation and Deep Impact Extended Investigation) to visit other comets, after being put to sleep in 2005 upon completion of the Tempel 1 mission.
Its first extended visit was to do a flyby of Comet Boethin, but with some complications. On July 21, 2005 Deep Impact executed a trajectory correction maneuver that allows the spacecraft to use Earth's gravity to begin a new mission in a path towards another comet.
The original plan was for a December 5, 2008 flyby of Comet Boethin, coming within 700 kilometers of the comet. However, as the Earth gravity assist approached, astronomers were unable to locate Comet Boethin, which may have broken up into pieces too faint to be observed. Consequently, its orbit could not be calculated with sufficient precision to permit a flyby.
JPL team targeted Deep Impact toward Comet Hartley 2. However, this would require an extra two years of travel for Deep Impact. On May 28, 2010, a burn of 11.3 seconds was conducted, to enable the June 27 Earth fly-by to be optimized for the transit to Hartley 2 and fly-by on November 4.
On November 4, 2010, the Deep Impact extended mission (EPOXI) returned images from comet Hartley 2.[63] EPOXI came within 700 kilometers of the comet, returning detailed photographs of the "peanut" shaped cometary nucleus and several bright jets. The probe's medium-resolution instrument captured the photographs.
On August 8, 2013, communications with the spacecraft were lost. The mission team determined the source of the problem on August 30, and attempted to restore communications.
On September 20, 2013, NASA abandoned further attempts to contact the craft and declared the mission lost.
