page_title: Champollion (spacecraft)
section_title: Deep Space 4 / Space Technology 4
hierarchical_section_title: Champollion (spacecraft) / Deep Space 4 / Space Technology 4
caption_attribution_description: English: Champollion (Deep Space 4 / Space Technology 4) Comet lander S99-04190 (1997) --- A massive, dirty snowball the size of a mountain plows through the Solar System, venting water vapor as it begins its inbound loop around the Sun. The proposed Champollion spacecraft lander anchors to the irregular surface and collects both surface and core samples. After transferring the samples and collecting other data, the ascent stage departs to rendezvous with the orbiting Earth return stage. This image produced for NASA by Pat Rawlings, (SAIC). Technical concepts for NASA's Exploration Office, Johnson Space Center (JSC). Concept with seperate orbiter and lander modules
context_page_description: Champollion was a planned cometary rendezvous and landing spacecraft. It was named after Jean-François Champollion, a French Egyptologist known for translating the Rosetta Stone.
context_section_description: Champollion was revived under NASA's New Millennium Program as Deep Space 4 / Space Technology 4, again as a joint project of NASA and CNES. In this version, Champollion would be a stand-alone project consisting of an orbiter and a lander, with the focus shifted somewhat to engineering validation of new technologies rather than pure science.
  As of March 1999, the baseline mission was to launch in April 2003, reaching comet Tempel 1 in 2006. The sample return element of the mission was at this point contingent on sufficient funding/resources, possibly being replaced with a demonstration of related capabilities.
  The lander was approximately 1.5m high weighing 160 kg; it was to autonomously navigate to the comet from 50 km altitude and anchor itself with a spike. The planned payload included:
  CHARGE, a gas chromatograph/mass spectrometer
  CIRCLE, cameras/microscope/IR spectrometer
  CIVA, panoramic cameras
  CPPP, "physical properties probes" to be driven into the cometary surface
  SATM drill mechanism
  gamma ray/neutron spectrometer
  The orbiter was to carry cameras and a dust monitor.
  Later in 1999, Space Technology 4 was scaled back to a single spacecraft with no sample return; it was cancelled entirely on July 1, 1999, due to budgetary constraints.
caption: Champollion (original concept)
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