Nasa’s planet hunter back in ‘stable state’

After a weekend of uncertainty for the Kepler spacecraft, Nasa let out a sigh of relief yesterday, saying “the spacecraft reached a stable state with the communication antenna pointed toward Earth.”

NASA posted a statement from mission manager Charlie Sobeck yesterday, saying the “mission has cancelled the spacecraft emergency, returning the Deep Space Network ground communications to normal scheduling.”

The spacecraft — responsible for detecting nearly 5,000 planets outside our solar system — slipped into emergency mode some time last week.