Hayabusa 2 has successfully touched down on an asteroid more than 186 million miles from Earth on a mission to collect samples that will hopefully provide more insight into the origins of the solar system.
This is the second attempt following a delay in October when a landing spot on the surface couldn’t be found.
The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, or JAXA, said on Friday Hayabusa 2 fired a small projectile into the surface of Ryugu to collect particles scientists hope the spacecraft will bring back to Earth for analysis.
“We may have caused some worry due to the delay but we carried out our plan flawlessly over the past four months to bring it to a successful landing,” project manager Yuichi Tsuda told a news conference.
“It landed in the best circumstances among the scenarios we envisioned,” he said.
Japan's Hayabusa2 #space probe successfully landed on the asteroid Ryugu and began collecting rock samples, the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) confirmed Friday. https://t.co/4cUOYEdY4u pic.twitter.com/rGLKM8GBiq
— China Daily (@ChinaDaily) February 22, 2019
"Follow Hayabusa2’s Landing on the Ryugu Asteroid" https://t.co/St6X8SbYHR #automation #robot #tech Space and Astronomy, Asteroids, Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, Japan, Solar System
— Sahdev Thakur (@sahdevt) February 21, 2019
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