This image of the asteroid Ryugo was captured by the Hayabusa 2 probe’s ONC-T camera at an altitude of about 64 meters (210 feet). Image was taken on Sept. 21. A large boulder is at bottom left, along with a scale bar indicating the length of 1 meter. (Credit: JAXA, University of Tokyo, Kochi University, Rikkyo University, Nagoya University, Chiba Institute of Technology, Meiji University, Aizu University, AIST)
The scientists and engineers behind Japan’s Hayabusa 2 mission made history last week when the mission’s mothership dropped two mini-rovers onto the surface of the asteroid Ryugu, 180 million miles from Earth, but they’re not resting on their laurels.
The first rovers to hop around an asteroid’s surface have continued to send back pictures of their travels — and so has the main spacecraft, which is keeping watch dozens of miles above them.
One of the pictures shows a high-resolution view of Ryugu’s surface from above, highlighted by a big boulder’s sharp shadow. The image was captured by the main spacecraft’s telescopic optical navigation camera, or ONC-T, as it closed in on Ryugu for the rover drop on Sept. 21.
An artist’s conception shows ispace’s lander and rover on the lunar surface. (ispace Illustration)
SpaceX has been signed up to provide rides to the moon for a pair of payloads built by ispace, a Japanese robotics and resource exploration company.
The announcement came today from ispace, the corporate heir to the Google Lunar X Prize’s Team Hakuto. The two lunar missions, tentatively set for 2020 and 2021, are part of a program called Hakuto-R, where Hakuto is the Japanese word for “white rabbit” and the R stands for “reboot.”
Ispace’s lunar orbiter/lander and lunar rovers would fly as secondary payloads on SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket. The primary goal for the first mission would be to put a spacecraft into lunar orbit. That would set the stage for the second mission, aimed at making a soft landing and deploying rovers to gather data on the lunar surface.
An image from the Hayabusa 2 mission’s Rover-1A shows the surface of the asteroid Ryugu at left. The bright white region is due to sunlight. The image, captured at 11:44 a.m. JST Sept. 22 (7:44 p.m. PT Sept. 21), is blurry because it was taken while the rover was in the middle of a hop over the surface. (JAXA Photo)
Two mini-rovers have sent their first pictures back from the surface of the asteroid Ryugu, a day after they were dropped off by Japan’s Hayabusa 2 spacecraft.
The pictures are blurry because they were taken while the rovers were falling and hopping around the half-mile-wide asteroid, more than 180 million miles from Earth.
As fuzzy as they are, the photos represent a huge victory for the $150 million Hayabusa 2 mission, which was launched nearly four years ago to get an unprecedented look at the surface of an asteroid.
The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency first tried to put a rover on the surface of an asteroid more than a decade ago, during a mission to a space rock called Itokawa. That part of the mission fizzled, however, when the MINERVA rover carrier missed the mark and sailed off into interplanetary space.
Hayabusa 2, in contrast, dropped its MINERVA-II-1 carrier right on target. The carrier deployed two 7-inch-wide, disk-shaped rovers that touched down on Ryugu’s rock-strewn terrain.
It took a while to get the pictures back to Earth because they had to be uploaded from the rovers to the mothership — and then relayed back to Earth for processing.
Japan’s Hayabusa 2 probe takes a picture of the asteroid Ryugu from a distance of about 135 meters (440 feet) with its own shadow seen on the surface. (JAXA Photo)
Japan’s Hayabusa 2 probe began the climactic phase of its mission overnight by sending out its first two rovers as it hovered less than 200 feet over an half-mile-wide asteroid, more than 180 million miles from Earth.
During the drop-off, the 18-foot-wide spacecraft even took a picture of its own shadow, spread out on the asteroid Ryugu’s rocky surface like a black-and-white copy of the Canadian flag.
The release of Hayabusa 2’s MINERVA-II-1 rovers occurred at 9:06 p.m. PT Sept. 20, mission controllers at the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency reported in a tweet. Hayabusa 2 dipped as low as 55 meters (180 feet) for the release, then retreated back from the asteroid.
Japanese billionaire Yusaku Maezawa and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk strike a pose at SpaceX’s headquarters in Hawthorne, Calif. (Yusaku Maezawa via Twitter)
SpaceX CEO Elon Musk today introduced Japanese billionaire Yusaku Maezawa as the first paying customer for a trip around the moon.
“Finally I can tell you that ‘I choose to go to the moon,’” Maezawa said, echoing President John F. Kennedy’s famous phrase.
Maezawa, 42, founded a mail-order retail business called Start Today in 1998, which spawned what’s now Japan’s largest fashion retail website, known as Zozotown. His net worth is estimated at more than $3 billion.
He’s made a name for himself as a musician and art collector as well as an entrepreneur. During tonight’s big reveal at SpaceX’s headquarters in Hawthorne, Calif., Maezawa said he intended to invite six to eight artists from around the world, on the level of the late Pablo Picasso or Michael Jackson, to go around the moon with him.
The Avatar X initiative would begin on Earth and move out to the International Space Station, other outposts, the moon and Mars. (ANA Holdings Graphic)
Telepresence robots on the moon and Mars? That’s the vision laid out for the partnership between ANA Holdings, the parent company of Japan’s All Nippon Airways, and the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency.
The ANA-JAXA program, known as Avatar X, aims to establish a public-private consortium to develop new types of human-controlled robots that can collect data and perform tasks in remote locations. The concept is in line with the ANA Avatar Vision that was unveiled in March, as well as with JAXA’s new J-SPARC research and development program.
A series of pictures from Japan’s Hayabusa 2 probe shows views of the asteroid Ryugu during the spacecraft’s approach. The closest views were captured from a distance of about 100 kilometers (62 miles), and reveal craters and boulders on the asteroid’s turning surface. (JAXA Photos)
Look! Up in the sky! It’s a dumpling … It’s a “Star Trek” Borg cube … It’s the asteroid Ryugu!
Our view of Ryugu, a half-mile-wide space rock nearly 180 million miles from Earth, is coming into sharper focus with the approach of the Japanese probe Hayabusa 2.
Three and a half years after its launch, the spacecraft is now within 35 miles of the asteroid, closing in on what’s expected to be a standoff orbital distance of 12 miles. The pictures that it’s been sending back throughout the approach provide enough detail to reveal Ryugu’s blocky shape.
Japan’s Team Hakuto is testing two small rovers known as Tetris (left foreground) and Moonraker (right background). The rovers would ride along with Team Indus’ spacecraft. (Team Hakuto Photo)
The rocketeers on Japan’s Team Hakuto say they’ve gotten the Google Lunar XPRIZE’s seal of approval on its plans for a mission to the moon.
The XPRIZE verification of Team Hakuto’s launch agreement with India’s Team Indus boosts the number of approved competitors to five. That includes Team Indus as well as Moon Express, Synergy Moon and SpaceIL.
“The Google Lunar XPRIZE has always pushed us beyond our limits” Takeshi Hakamada, Team Hakuto’s leader, said in today’s news release. “We will continue to challenge ourselves next year and choose an optimal path to reach the moon.”
Team Hakuto is run by a Tokyo-based startup called ispace, and draws upon expertise from faculty and students at Tohoku University.
A Japanese H-IIB rocket rises from its launch pad at the Tanegashima Space Center, sending the HTV-6 cargo ship into space. (NASA TV)
A critical resupply mission to the International Space Station got off to a good start with the launch of Japan’s HTV-6 robotic cargo spacecraft today.
The bus-sized H-II Transfer Vehicle rose into space atop an H-IIB rocket from the Tanegashima Space Center in southern Japan at 10:26 p.m. local time (5:26 a.m. PT). A little more than 15 minutes later, HTV-6 successfully separated from the rocket.
It’ll take four days for the 12-ton cargo ship to catch up with the space station in orbit. For the final rendezvous, crew members will use the station’s robotic arm to pull the craft in for berthing at the Harmony module’s port.
The HTV craft, also known as Kounotori (“White Stork”), is carrying more than 4.5 tons of supplies and equipment for the station’s six spacefliers, including lithium-ion batteries that will replace the nickel-hydrogen batteries currently used to store power generated by the solar arrays. The new batteries will be installed during a series of spacewalks next month.
