Hayabusa-2 Set To Return Earth
- 05-Dec-2020
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Six years after Japan’s Hayabusa2 mission was launched, it is set to return back to Earth on December 6 carrying with it samples from the one-kilometre wide Ryugu asteroid that orbits the Sun.
The mission is similar to NASA’s OSIRIS-REX mission that brought back samples from asteroid Bennu late in October. According to the Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA), this is the first time that a probe has visited a celestial body that is under 100 metres in diameter.
The Hayabasu2 mission was launched in December 2014 when the spacecraft was sent on a six-year-long voyage to study the asteroid Ryugu and collect samples to the Earth.
The spacecraft arrived at the asteroid in mid-2018 after which it deployed two rovers and a small lander onto the surface. In 2019, the spacecraft fired an impactor into the asteroid’s surface to create an artificial crater with a diametre of a little more than 10 metres, which allowed it to collect the samples.
As per NASA, the asteroid is thought to be made up mostly of nickel and iron. “Asteroids like Ryugu are interesting for several reasons, perhaps foremost because they are near the Earth and might, one day in the far future, pose an impact threat.
