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Lander captures views of asteroid’s rugged terrain

Ryugu's surface
The MASCOT lander’s view of asteroid Ryugu’s lumpy, bumpy surface was displayed during a post-mission news conference. Click on the image for more from German science writer Daniel Fischer’s Skyweek 2.0 website. (DLR Photo / Processed by Daniel Fischer)

Japan’s Hayabusa 2 probe and the German-French MASCOT lander have teamed up to send back amazing views of an asteroid that’s more than 180 million miles from Earth, including a snapshot of the lander falling toward the asteroid and an on-the-ground view of its rocky terrain.

Scientists shared the images today at the International Astronautical Congress in Germany, during a recap of MASCOT’s successful 17-hour survey of the asteroid Ryugu. Hayabusa 2, which has been hovering above the half-mile-wide asteroid for weeks, dropped the foot-wide, boxy lander onto the surface on Oct. 3.

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Lander plops down on asteroid for 17-hour survey

MASCOT lander
An artist’s conception shows MASCOT on the surface of asteroid Ryugu. (JAXA Illustration)

A robotic probe the size of a shoebox set itself down on the asteroid Ryugu, more than 180 million miles from Earth, and conducted a 17-hour survey of its rocky surroundings.

The foot-wide, German-built lander is called MASCOT, which stands for Mobile Asteroid Surface Scout. It was ejected from Japan’s Hayabusa 2 probe from a height of 51 meters (167 feet) and drifted downward to Ryugu at walking speed.

“It could not have gone better,” Tra-Mi Ho, MASCOT project manager at the DLR Institute of Space Systems, said today in a status update. “From the lander’s telemetry, we were able to see that it separated from the mothercraft and made contact with the asteroid surface approximately 20 minutes later.”

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