WATCH: NASA’s OSIRIS-REx spacecraft arrives at asteroid Bennu
NASA's Osiris-Rex spacecraft arrived at asteroid Bennu Monday afternoon, two years and more than two billion miles after launching from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station.
Achievement unlocked: "We have arrived!" Our @OSIRISREx mission reached asteroid Bennu, where it will spend almost a year mapping and studying to find a safe location to collect a sample. Watch: https://t.co/zI282xjLzc pic.twitter.com/VMPs7SIfSf
— NASA (@NASA) December 3, 2018
The meeting is part of the agency’s $800-million mission to the Mars-Jupiter asteroid belt.
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NASA broadcast the arrival on NASA TV and also aired a preview program. If you missed the footage, you can rewatch it here, via Periscope.
#WelcomeToBennu! After two years of travel – and more than a decade of planning and work by my team – I’m here. But Arrival is just the beginning… https://t.co/0bQPUwqUCp
— NASA's OSIRIS-REx (@OSIRISREx) December 3, 2018
Credit: NASA/Goddard/University of Arizona pic.twitter.com/VyPG3gRRdw
OSIRIS-Rex (Origins, Spectral Interpretation, Resource Identification, Security-Regolith Explorer) will spend about a year surveying the asteroid "with the goal of selecting a location that is safe and scientifically interesting to collect the sample," according to NASA.
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"Collecting and analyzing a sample of the asteroid could tell scientists a lot about the origins of our solar system, its planets, and the source of organic molecules that may have given rise to life on Earth," Wired Magazine reported. If the mission planners are able to obtain a sample of at least 2 ounces, "it'll be the largest such sample NASA has collected since the Apollo missions in the 1970s."
The spacecraft will return the asteroid sample to Earth in September 2023.
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