8/31/2023 0 Comments With its space nasa dart returns![]() Instead of chasing down an asteroid and collecting a sample, this time, OSIRIS-APEX will wait for its subject. On the next leg of its journey, the spacecraft will be called OSIRIS-APEX with a new principal investigator, University of Arizona planetary science professor Daniella DellaGiustina. More than 13 years ago, JAXA's Hayabusa spacecraft collected a sample from asteroid Itokawa and then two years ago, Hayabusa collected and returned a sample from another asteroid called Ryugu.Īfter the drop -off, OSIRIS-Rex will begin a new mission to study near-Earth asteroid Apophis. Japan became the first nation to collect a sample from an asteroid. NASA will also share some of the sample with JAXA, the Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency. The sample will be analyzed to learn more about how we got here and how Earth could deflect a potentially-hazardous asteroid like Bennu when that becomes necessary. On opening day, a Lockheed employee will have the honor of opening the capsule lid.Īsteroids are essentially fossils of our solar system, and scientists believe Bennu contains material that may date back to the formation of our solar system. Lockheed Martin built and operates the spacecraft for NASA and is responsible for the capsule recovery. When the real thing happens, the capsule will be collected with every effort to maintain a pristine sample and won't be opened until it's brought to NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston. The OSIRIS-REx mission team will use tracking cameras and radar to practice recovery operations during this dress rehearsal. ![]() In August, a helicopter will drop a replica of the return capsule in the middle of the landing zone about the size of Rhode Island. Army’s Dugway Proving Ground was founded after the Pearl Harbor attack.Īs the sample return date nears, the team has been rehearsing procedures to collect and protect the sample from contaminants. The landing zone is within a 250-square-mile area at the Department of Defense’s Utah Test and Training Range. In September, OSIRIS-REx will deploy a small capsule with Bennu dirt inside, setting it on a trajectory for Earth. 'LOSS OF SIGNAL:' NASA SUCCESSFULLY CRASHES DART SPACECRAFT INTO ASTEROID FOR PLANETARY DEFENSE ![]() OSIRIS-REx – a fancy acronym for Origins Spectral Interpretation Resource Identification Security Regolith Explorer – collected an estimated 2 pounds of asteroid rocks and dirt known as regolith in 2020.īefore the spacecraft used its pogo-stick-like arm to vacuum up regolith, it first took two years of spaceflight to catch up with the asteroid and then orbited the small world, mapping its surface. NASA’s first spacecraft to collect a sample from an asteroid will complete its 7-year mission later this year when OSIRIS-REx drops off some of asteroid Bennu in Utah.
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