For a billion miles, the tireless spacecraft called Rosetta has shadowed an icy comet through the solar system, enduring dust storms, fountains of gas and the comet’s mood swings.

The Rosetta spacecraft has been orbiting the 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko comet for two years. Now scientists have ended the mission, and the spacecraft has lost contact with Earth forever.

The spacecraft that conducted previous comet missions blew by their targets at more than half a mile per second or far faster, whereas Rosetta will travel at a leisurely 3 feet or so per second.

At around 10:30 am EST Wednesday morning, a small probe named Philae made history — by becoming the first spacecraft to ever land on a comet. After a seven hour journey down from Rosetta, the ...

Rosetta's historic 12-year mission 30 photos. The European Space Agency’s $1.6 billion Rosetta spacecraft completed a deliberate crash landing on the surface of comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko ...

The European Space Agency’s Rosetta spacecraft descended to a gentle mission-ending crash landing on comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko early Friday, beaming back a final series of increasingly ...

Read news, see photos and watch videos about the Rosetta mission's landing on Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko scheduled for Nov. 12.

Rosetta’s OSIRIS narrow-angle camera captured this image of Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko at 08:18 GMT from an altitude of about 5.8 km during the spacecraft’s final descent on 30 September.

On Wednesday morning the Rosetta spacecraft kept a 10 year date with an icy comet the size of a mountain. About 2:30 a.m., the spacecraft made the last of a series of 10 engine firings it began in ...

The Rosetta spacecraft hibernated for 31 months while its orbit took it too far away from the sun for its solar arrays to keep it operational. It's ready for a rendezvous with a comet Aug. 6.