OSIRIS-REx on its way back to Earth
OSIRIS-REx today fired its engines and successfully put itself on course for returning its samples from the asteroid Bennu to Earth on September 24, 2023.
The May 10 departure date was precisely timed based on the alignment of Bennu with Earth. The goal of the return maneuver is to get the spacecraft within about 6,000 miles (approximately 10,000 kilometers) of Earth in September 2023. Although OSIRIS-REx still has plenty of fuel remaining, the team is trying to preserve as much as possible for a potential extended mission to another asteroid after returning the sample capsule to Earth. The team will investigate the feasibility of such a mission this summer.
The spacecraft’s course will be determined mainly by the Sun’s gravity, but engineers will need to occasionally make small course adjustments via engine burns.
The science team has already proposed one option, sending the spacecraft on a rendezvous with the potentially dangerous asteroid Apophis shortly after its 2029 close-fly of Earth. It could be that there are other targets as interesting that they need to choose from.
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
OSIRIS-REx today fired its engines and successfully put itself on course for returning its samples from the asteroid Bennu to Earth on September 24, 2023.
The May 10 departure date was precisely timed based on the alignment of Bennu with Earth. The goal of the return maneuver is to get the spacecraft within about 6,000 miles (approximately 10,000 kilometers) of Earth in September 2023. Although OSIRIS-REx still has plenty of fuel remaining, the team is trying to preserve as much as possible for a potential extended mission to another asteroid after returning the sample capsule to Earth. The team will investigate the feasibility of such a mission this summer.
The spacecraft’s course will be determined mainly by the Sun’s gravity, but engineers will need to occasionally make small course adjustments via engine burns.
The science team has already proposed one option, sending the spacecraft on a rendezvous with the potentially dangerous asteroid Apophis shortly after its 2029 close-fly of Earth. It could be that there are other targets as interesting that they need to choose from.
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
This may be the most important mission ever-getting a glimpse of this threat. If possible…maybe do a hard burn in passing so as to be able to image as much surface area so as to do a 3D reconstruction-atlas. Too fast to orbit this body-but if it rotates-you might see more sides.
As an orbital mechanic, I make a good plumber, but what does it do in the meantime? It’s not as if it will just sit somewhere waiting for a target to appear.
The goal of the return maneuver is to get the spacecraft within about 6,000 miles of Earth
Presumably, the sample capsule can then perform whatever maneuver is needed to drop itself into the atmosphere for braking.
But won’t the spacecraft get a gravity slingshot of some sort that will fling it off into wherever? I can see the goal of making that “wherever” into something useful, but I think the options would be SEVERELY limited.
I just looked it up: Luna(*) is ~240,000 miles from Earth, so 6,000 miles is very close – significantly under geosync orbit even- that slingshot effect is going to be dramatic.
(*) I don’t like “the moon” because there are so many moons. Maybe “the Moon” as a compromise?