OSIRIS-REx spacecraft reaches Bennu, and it will bring a piece of the asteroid back to Earth
NASA’s OSIRIS-REx mission to scoop up a piece of an asteroid and send it back to Earth is about to rendezvous with its target.
After a two-year journey through the solar system, the spacecraft has finally caught up with Bennu, a small, dark space rock that is orbiting the sun about 75 million miles from Earth.
On Monday, OSIRIS-REx — which stands for Origins, Spectral Interpretation, Resource Identification, Security-Regolith Explorer — will come within 13 miles of its new traveling companion.
Once the spacecraft arrives, mission controllers at the Lockheed Martin Space facility in Littleton, Colo., will begin to guide it even closer to the asteroid’s surface, where it will survey Bennu from a distance of just four miles.
Read more: https://www.latimes.com/science/sciencenow/la-sci-sn-osiris-rex-reaches-benu-20181203-story.html
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