Hayabusa2 landing DELAYED by challenging surface on asteroid Ryugu
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Loading... - Agnes Lehnert
- 12 Oct 2021
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The Japanese space agency JAXA has delayed landing its probe Hayabusa2 on the asteroid Ryugu until January because the surface was more rugged than expected project manager Yuichi Tsuda said.
Originally due to land on the planet in late October, the probe will now attempt to land in late January at the earliest.
Tsuda said "We had expected the surface would be smooth... but it seems there's no flat area".
The ultimate goal is for Hayabusa2 to descend to the surface of Ryugu and to shoot a 5-gram tantalum bullet into the asteroid. A horn on the probe will then collect dust samples which will be returned to Earth in 2020.
To do this the probe will fire its ion engines and make the journey back to earth. Once here it will release a sealed capsule that will enter the atmosphere and land, ready for recovery. It's a pretty ambitious project.
n total Hayabusa2 carries a total of four rovers. Rovers 1A and 1B are already on the surface and have transmitted some amazing results already . Both these devices were deployed by MINERVA-II-1.
These two rovers are able to jump around on the surface and thanks to the low gravity can be floating for up to 15 minutes.
A container, MINERVA-II-2, holds Rover-2 which is scheduled to land in July 2019. It will look for floating dust particles using optical and ultraviolet light.
Another probe, MASCOT, was dropped onto the asteroid on October 3. It has transmitted photos back and is analysing the thermal environment, magnetic fields and an infrared spectrometer will work out what the surface is made from.
The hope is that samples from Ryugu will help is determine if materials from space, like asteroids crashing, gave rise to life on Earth.
You can monitor what Hayabusa2 is doing in real time via the haya2now site . If you're really keen, you can also see when NASA's Deep Space Network is talking to the probe using the NASA DSN site.
