Video: Mission control celebrates separation but anxiety builds over landing

This animation shows Comet Siding Spring’s path as it comes within 132,000 kilometres (82,000 miles) of Mars on 19 October 2014.

For some comets, breaking up is not that hard to do. A new study indicates that the bodies of some periodic comets — objects that orbit the Sun in less than 200 years — may regularly split in two, then reunite down the road. This may be a repeating process fundamental to comet evolution.

The European Space Agency’s Rosetta probe has shifted into a higher orbit around comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko in readiness for the release of its Philae lander on 12 November.