EUROPE’S space scientists plan to launch a £600 million mission next Thursday to chase down a comet and land a spacecraft on its surface.

After being delayed for more than a year, the European Space Agency Rosetta craft is ready to go from its launch site in French Guiana, its designers said yesterday.

Ian Wright, of the Open University, one of the British experts working on the project, said the idea of the “audacious mission” was to study a comet in more detail than has been done before.

“Comets are potentially incredibly important in the development of the Earth and the development of life,” Mr Wright said. “It is entirely possible that the water on the Earth was brought here by comets in the initial formation process of the planets. Comets contain water and organic molecules — these are the veritable building blocks of life.”

The mission was originally planned for launch in January last year but was delayed after an Ariane-5 rocket, which was due to carry Rosetta, exploded three minutes after lift-off.

The first comet chosen for the mission was Wirtanen. The new target is to be the comet Churyumov-Gerasimenko, which at about 2½ miles (4km) across is much bigger than Wirtanen. Rosetta will reach the comet in 2014. The main Rosetta orbiter will study how the comet disintegrates as it gets closer to the Sun, forming the distinctive comet “tail”. A small lander craft, Philae, will detach from the orbiter and skewer itself into the comet’s surface.

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