NASA 'Outlaw' to Return Stolen Satellite Used to Intercept First Comet

In September of 1985 the United States made yet another pioneering space effort when they became the first to have a satellite intercept a comet, thanks to Robert Farquhar, who defied NASA's orders to fulfill the achievement.

Farquhar and his accomplices decided to "steal" a spacecraft, which has spent nearly three decades on an orbit around the sun. He didn't physically steal the satellite; he simply diverted the International Sun-Earth Explorer-3 (ISEE-3) through a complicated trajectory that would allow it to intercept the Giacobini-Zinner comet months before any other country could intercept the highly anticipated Halley's Comet. This effort allowed the U.S. to become the first to intercept a comet.

Other countries around the world were focusing on intercepting Halley's Comet, and NASA decided they would not attempt to do so because it was time consuming and very expensive. This did not sit well with Mr. Farquhar, whose gutsy efforts earned him a congratulatory letter from Ronald Reagan, who was the president at the time.

The ISEE-3 was being used to study solar winds before Mr. Farquhar "borrowed" it for a little while.

"Ok, so we took it away in 1983, and you get it back in 2014," he said on NPR Radio. "How many years is that? That's about 31 years."

He's always promised to return the satellite from the orbit he sent it in, and within the next few months the moon's gravity will change its path, which Farquhar believes could return the satellite from its comet-chasing path back to its original intended orbit. However, it may be an issue because a majority of those who worked on the ISEE-3 have retired and the old equipment used to communicate with the satellite has been trashed due to advancements in deep space technology.

But the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory has the right hardware that could possibly communicate with the ISEE-3. NASA has granted permission for scientists to begin utilizing the equipment to see if it could return the satellite back to its original orbit.

Although Mr. Farquhar is determined to return the ISEE-3 back to its original path, he says the chances are "50-50." If it doesn't work, the satellite will whiz by the Earth in August and most likely will never again come close enough to be recaptured.

To read more about Robert Farquhar and the ISEE-3, visit this Fox News article as well as this NPR article.