osiris rex asteroid

Historic! Osiris-Rex touches down on Earth, brings back major asteroid in NASA first

24Sep

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Technology

Historic! Osiris-Rex touches down on Earth, brings back major asteroid in NASA first

[ad_1] A seven-year space voyage came to its climactic end Sunday when a NASA capsule landed in the desert in the US state of Utah, carrying to Earth the largest asteroid samples ever collected. Scientists have high hopes for the sample, saying it will provide a better understanding of the formation of our solar system and how Earth became habitable. "Touchdown of the Osiris-Rex sample return capsule!" a commentator said on NASA's live video webcast of the landing, as engineers and team members applauded at a nearby mission control center.Completing a 3.86-billion-mile (6.21 billion-kilometer) journey, it marked the United States' first sample return mission of its kind, the US space agency said in a post on X, the former Twitter. NASA chief Bill Nelson hailed the mission and said the a...

OSIRIS-REx: NASA’s first asteroid sample on track for Sunday parachute landing in Utah

[ad_1] A NASA space capsule carrying a sample of rocky material plucked from the surface of an asteroid three years ago hurtled toward Earth this weekend headed for a fiery plunge through the atmosphere and a parachute landing in the Utah desert on Sunday. Weather forecasts were favorable and the robotic spacecraft OSIRIS-REx was on course to release the sample-return capsule for final descent as planned, with no further adjustments to its flight path needed, NASA officials said at a news briefing on Friday.Mission managers are expecting a "spot-on" touchdown on the U.S. military's vast Utah Test and Training range, west of Salt Lake City, said Sandra Freund, program manager at Lockheed Martin, which designed and built the spacecraft. The round, gumdrop-shaped capsule is scheduled to la...

Menacing asteroid racing towards Earth for dangerously close approach today

[ad_1] Apocalyptic movies like Armageddon have explored the possibility of total annihilation if an asteroid strikes on Earth. Although asteroids make close approaches to Earth nearly every day, none of them impact the surface. But what if an asteroid, which can end life, actually hits Earth? The plan to save the planet wouldn't be as fancy as Bruce Willis drilling into the asteroid to nuke it. NASA has already carried out the testing of its DART Mission for planetary protection which involves crashing a spacecraft into an oncoming asteroid to successfully divert it from its path. This could help prevent an asteroid collision and save billions of lives.But success depends on what kind of asteroid it is. If it is not hard or metallic, then the crash deflection strategy may well not work....