flyby Archives

September 9, 2024September 9, 2024 by Evan Gough

BepiColombo’s New Images of Mercury are Cool

BepiColombo captured this image of Mercury with its Monitoring Camera 3 when it was about 555 km above the surface. It shows the newly-named Stoddart Crater. Image Credit: ESA/BepiColombo/MTM CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO

The ESA/JAXA BepiColombo spacecraft made another flyby of its eventual target, Mercury. This is one of a series of Mercury flybys, as the spacecraft completes a complex set of maneuvers designed to deliver it to the innermost planet’s orbit. Its cameras captured some fantastic images of Mercury.

May 31, 2023May 31, 2023 by Laurence Tognetti

If You’re Going to Visit Venus, Why Not Include an Asteroid Flyby Too?

Radar image of Venus created by the Solar System Visualization project and the Magellan science team at the JPL Multimission Image Processing Laboratory. This is a single frame from a video released at the October 29, 1991, JPL news conference. (Credit: NASA/JPL)

A recent study submitted to Acta Astronautica examines the prospect of designing a Venus mission flight plan that would involve visiting a nearby asteroid after performing a gravity assist maneuver at Venus but prior to final contact with the planet. The study was conducted by Vladislav Zubko, who is a researcher and PhD Candidate at the Space Research Institute of the Russian Academy of Science (RAS) and has experience studying potential flight plans to various planetary bodies throughout the solar system.

February 10, 2022February 10, 2022 by Nancy Atkinson

Wow. Parker Solar Probe Took a Picture of the Surface of Venus

Surface features seen in the WISPR images (left) match ones seen in those from the Magellan mission (right). Credits: NASA/APL/NRL (left), Magellan Team/JPL/USGS (right)

The Parker Solar Probe’s mission is to study the Sun. But the spacecraft’s instruments have nabbed some pretty impressive data on Venus, as it uses the planet for gravity assists in its ever-shrinking solar orbit.

Now, the spacecraft has captured visible light images of Venus’ surface, somehow able to peer through the shroud of clouds in the planet’s atmosphere.

This is complete bonus data that wasn’t ever expected.

October 12, 2021October 12, 2021 by Andy Tomaswick

BepiColombo’s First Pictures of Mercury

BepiColombo recently had its first close flyby of Mercury, its eventual mission target, and got to snap some pictures to commemorate the event. Even at this early stage of the mission, these images are some of the clearest we have ever had of the innermost planet.

September 30, 2021September 30, 2021 by Evan Gough

BepiColombo Meets Mercury for the First Time on October 1

New research suggests that Mercury is still contracting and shrinking. Credits: NASA/JHUAPL/Carnegie Institution of Washington/USGS/Arizona State University

BepiColombo made a quick visit to Venus in August and is on to its next rendezvous. On October 1st it’ll perform a flyby of Mercury, the spacecraft’s eventual destination. This visit is just a little flirtation—one of six—ahead of its eventual orbital link-up with Mercury in late 2025.

The quick visit will yield some scientific results, though, and they’ll be just a taste of what’s ahead in BepiColumbo’s one-year mission to Mercury.

September 25, 2020September 25, 2020 by Evan Gough

Hayabusa2’s Mission isn’t Over. It has a New Asteroid Target to Visit: 1998 KY26

An illustration of the asteroid 1998 KY26. Hayabusa2's mission has been extended and it will rendezvous with this asteroid in 2031. Image Credits: Auburn University/JAXA

In an expected move, the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) has announced a mission extension for their Hayabusa2 spacecraft. Hayabusa2 will be sent to rendezvous with another asteroid in a few years time.

It’s target is 1998 KY26, a near-Earth object (NEO) less than a kilometer in diameter. But it’ll take a while and some maneuvering around other objects in the Solar System to reach its goal. JAXA says the spacecraft will arrive at the asteroid in July 2031.

February 12, 2017February 12, 2017 by Bob King

Meet Asteroid 2017 BQ6 — A Giant, Spinning Brick

This composite of 25 images of asteroid 2017 BQ6 was generated with radar data collected using NASA’s Goldstone Solar System Radar in California’s Mojave Desert. It sped by Earth on Feb. 7 at a speed of around 25,560 mph (7.1 km/s) relative to the planet. The images have resolutions as fine as 12 feet (3.75 meters) per pixel. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/GSSR

To radar imager Lance Benner at JPL in Pasadena, asteroid 2017 BQ6 resembles the polygonal dice used in Dungeons and Dragons. But my eyes see something closer to a stepping stone or paver you’d use to build a walkway. However you picture it, this asteroid is more angular than most imaged by radar.

It flew harmlessly by Earth on Feb. 7 at 1:36 a.m. EST (6:36 UT) at about 6.6 times the distance between Earth and the moon or some about 1.6 million miles. Based on 2017 BQ6’s brightness, astronomers estimate the hurtling boulder about 660 feet (200 meters) across. The recent flyby made for a perfect opportunity to bounce radio waves off the object, harvest their echoes and build an image of giant space boulder no one had ever seen close up before.

NASA’s 70-meter antennas are the largest and most sensitive Deep Sky Network antennas, capable of tracking a spacecraft traveling tens of billions of miles from Earth. This one at Goldstone not only tracked Voyager 2’s Neptune encounter, it also received Neil Armstrong’s famous communication from Apollo 11: “That’s one small step for a man. One giant leap for mankind.” Credit: JPL-Caltech/GSSR

The images of the asteroid were obtained on Feb. 6 and 7 with NASA’s 230-foot (70-meter) antenna at the Goldstone Deep Space Communications Complex in California and reveal an irregular, angular-appearing asteroid:

Animation of 2017 BQ6. The near-Earth asteroid has a rotation period of about 3 hours. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/GSSR

“The radar images show relatively sharp corners, flat regions, concavities, and small bright spots that may be boulders,” said Lance Benner of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, who leads the agency’s asteroid radar research program. “Asteroid 2017 BQ6 reminds me of the dice used when playing Dungeons and Dragons.”

2017 BQ6 was discovered on Jan. 26 by the NASA-funded Lincoln Near Earth Asteroid Research (LINEAR) Project, operated by MIT Lincoln Laboratory on the Air Force Space Command’s Space Surveillance Telescope at White Sands Missile Range, New Mexico.

Radar has been used to observe hundreds of asteroids. Even through very large telescopes, 2017 BQ6 would have appeared exactly like a star, but the radar technique reveals shape, size, rotation, roughness and even surface features.

This chart shows how data from NASA’s Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer, or WISE, has led to revisions in the estimated population of near-Earth asteroids. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech

To create the images, Benner conducted a controlled experiment on the asteroid, transmitting a signal with well-known characteristics to the object and then, by comparing the echo to the transmission, deduced its properties. According to NASA’s Asteroid Radar Research site, measuring how the echo power spreads out over time along with changes in its frequency caused by the Doppler Effect (object approaching or receding from Earth), provide the data to construct two-dimensional images with resolutions finer than 33 feet (10 meters) if the echoes are strong enough.

This orbital diagram shows the close approach of 2017 BQ6 to Earth on Feb. 7, 2017. Credit: NASA/JPL Horizons

In late October 2016, the number of known near-Earth asteroids topped 15,000 with new discoveries averaging about 30 a week. A near-Earth asteroid is defined as a rocky body that approaches within approximately 1.3 times Earth’s average distance to the Sun. This distance then brings the asteroid within roughly 30 million miles (50 million km) of Earth’s orbit. To date, astronomers have already discovered more than 90% of the estimated number of the large near-Earth objects or those larger than 0.6 miles (1 km). It’s estimated that more than a million NEAs smaller than 330 feet (100 meters) lurk in the void. Time to get crackin’.

August 14, 2015December 30, 2015 by Jason Major

Ride Along with New Horizons on its Pluto Flyby

On July 14, 2015, after nine and a half years journeying across the Solar System, NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft made its historic close pass of Pluto and its moon Charon. Traveling a relative velocity of nearly 13.8 km/s (that’s almost 31,000 mph!) New Horizons passed through the Pluto system in a matter of hours but the views it captured from approach to departure held the world spellbound with their unexpected beauty. Those images and data – along with a bit of imagination – have been used by space imaging enthusiast Björn Jónsson to create an animation of New Horizons’ Pluto pass as if we were traveling along with the spacecraft – check it out above.

You can find more science images and discoveries about Pluto and Charon from New Horizons here, and see more renderings and animations by Jónsson on his website here.

July 12, 2015December 23, 2015 by Bob King

Pluto’s Time to Shine Just Hours Away – A Guide and Timetable

Graphic showing New Horizons' busy schedule before and during the flyby. Credit: NASA

Countdown to discovery! Not since Voyager 2’s flyby of Neptune in 1989 have we flung a probe into the frozen outskirts of the Solar System. Speeding along at 30,800 miles per hour New Horizons will pierce the Pluto system like a smartly aimed arrow.

Pluto as seen from New Horizons on July 11, 2015. Credits: NASA/JHUAPL/SWRI — Newest view of Pluto seen from New Horizons on July 11, 2015 shows a world that continues to grow more fascinating and look stranger every day. See annotated version below.
Credits: NASA/JHUAPL/SWRI

On July 11, 2015, New Horizons captured a world that is growing more fascinating by the day. For the first time on Pluto, this view reveals linear features that may be cliffs, as well as a circular feature that could be an impact crater. Rotating into view is the bright heart-shaped feature that will be seen in more detail during New Horizons’ closest approach on July 14. The annotated version includes a diagram indicating Pluto’s north pole, equator, and central meridian. Credits: NASA/JHUAPL/SWRI — For the first time on Pluto, this view reveals linear features that may be cliffs, as well as a circular feature that could be an impact crater. Rotating into view is the bright heart-shaped feature that will be seen in more detail during New Horizons’ closest approach on July 14. The annotated version includes a diagram indicating Pluto’s north pole, equator, and central meridian.
Credits: NASA/JHUAPL/SWRI

Edging within 7,800 miles of its surface at 7:49 a.m. EDT, the spacecraft’s long-range telescopic camera will resolve features as small as 230 feet (70 meters). Fourteen minutes later, it will zip within 17,930 miles of Charon as well as image Pluto’s four smaller satellites — Hydra, Styx, Nix and Kerberos.

This image shows New Horizons' current position (3 p.m. EDT July 12) along its planned Pluto flyby trajectory. The green segment of the line shows where New Horizons has traveled; the red indicates the spacecraft's future path. The Pluto is tilted up like a target because the planet's axis is tipped 123° to the plane of its orbit. Credit: NASA/JHUAPL/SWRI — This image shows New Horizons’ current position (3 p.m. EDT July 12) along its planned Pluto flyby trajectory. The green segment of the line shows where New Horizons has traveled; the red indicates the spacecraft’s future path. The Pluto system is tilted on end because the planet’s axis is tipped 123° to the plane of its orbit. Credit: NASA/JHUAPL/SWRI

After zooming past, the craft will turn to photograph Pluto eclipsing the Sun as it looks for the faint glow of rings or dust sheets illuminated by backlight. At the same time, sunlight reflecting off Charon will faintly illuminate Pluto’s backside. What could be more romantic than Charonshine?

Six other science instruments will build thermal maps of the Pluto-Charon pair, measure the composition of the surface and atmosphere and observe Pluto’s interaction with the solar wind. All of this will happen autopilot. It has to. There’s just no time to send a change instructions because of the nearly 9-hour lag in round-trip communications between Earth and probe.

Instruments New Horizons will use to characterize Pluto are REX (atmospheric composition and temperature; PEPSSI (composition of plasma escaping Pluto's atmosphere); SWAP (solar wind); LORRI (close up camera for mapping, geological data); Star Dust Counter (student experiment measuring space dust during the voyage); Ralph (visible and IR imager/spectrometer for surface composition and thermal maps and Alice (composition of atmosphere and search for atmosphere around Charon). Credit: NASA/Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory/Southwest Research Institute — Instruments New Horizons will use to characterize Pluto are REX (atmospheric composition and temperature); PEPSSI (composition of plasma escaping Pluto’s atmosphere); SWAP (solar wind studies); LORRI (close up camera for mapping, geological data); Star Dust Counter (student experiment measuring space dust during the voyage); Ralph (visible and IR imager/spectrometer for surface composition and thermal maps) and Alice (composition of atmosphere and search for atmosphere around Charon). Credit: NASA/Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory/Southwest Research Institute

Want to go along for the ride? Download and install NASA’s interactive app Eyes on Pluto and then click the launch button on the website. You’ll be shown several options including a live view and preview. Click preview and sit back to watch the next few days of the mission unfold before your eyes.

American astronomer Clyde Tombaugh discovered Pluto in 1903 from Lowell Observatory. Tombaugh died in 1997, but an ounce of his ashes, affixed to the spacecraft in a 2-inch aluminum container. "Interned herein are remains of American Clyde W. Tombaugh, discoverer of Pluto and the solar system's 'third zone.' Adelle and Muron's boy, Patricia's husband, Annette and Alden's father, astronomer, teacher, punster, and friend: Clyde Tombaugh (1906-1997)" — American astronomer Clyde Tombaugh discovered Pluto in 1930 from Lowell Observatory. Tombaugh died in 1997, but an ounce of his ashes, affixed to the spacecraft in a 2-inch aluminum container. “Interned herein are remains of American Clyde W. Tombaugh, discoverer of Pluto and the solar system’s ‘third zone.’ Adelle and Muron’s boy, Patricia’s husband, Annette and Alden’s father, astronomer, teacher, punster, and friend: Clyde Tombaugh (1906-1997)”

Like me, you’ve probably wondered how daylight on Pluto compares to that on Earth. From 3 billion miles away, the Sun’s too small to see as a disk with the naked eye but still wildly bright. With NASA’s Pluto Time, select your city on an interactive map and get the time of day when the two are equal. For my city, daylight on Pluto equals the gentle light of early evening twilight six minutes after sunset. An ideal time for walking, but step lightly. In Pluto’s gentle gravity, you only weigh 1/15 as much as on Earth.

Pluto and its cohorts in the icy-asteroid-rich Kuiper Belt beyond the orbit of Neptune. Credit: NASA — Pluto and its inclined orbit are highlighted among the hundreds of thousands of icy asteroids in the Kuiper Belt beyond Neptune. Credit: NASA

New Horizons is the first mission to the Kuiper Belt, a gigantic zone of icy bodies and mysterious small objects orbiting beyond Neptune. This region also is known as the “third” zone of our solar system, beyond the inner rocky planets and outer gas giants. Pluto is its most famous member, though not necessarily the largest. Eris, first observed in 2003, is nearly identical in size. It’s estimated there are hundreds of thousands of icy asteroids larger than 61 miles (100 km) across along with a trillion comets in the Belt, which begins at 30 a.u. (30 times Earth’s distance from the Sun) and reaches to 55 a.u.

During its fleeting flyby, New Horizons will slice across the Pluto system, turning this way and that to photograph and gather data on everything it can. Crucial occultations are shown that will be used to determine the structure and composition of Pluto’s (and possibly Charon’s) atmosphere. Credit: NASA with additions by the author — During its fleeting flyby, New Horizons will slice across the Pluto system, turning this way and that to photograph and gather data on everything it can. Crucial occultations are shown that will be used to determine the structure and composition of Pluto’s (and possibly Charon’s) atmosphere. Sunlight reflected from Charon will also faintly illuminate Pluto’s backside. Credit: NASA with additions by the author

Below you’ll find a schedule of events in Eastern Time. (Subtract one hour for Central, 2 hours for Mountain and 3 hours for Pacific). Keep in mind the probe will be busy shooting photos and gathering data during the flyby, so we’ll have to wait until Wednesday July 15 to see the the detailed close ups of Pluto and its moons. Even then, New Horizons’ recorders will be so jammed with data and images, it’ll take months to beam it all back to Earth.

Chasms, craters, and a dark north polar region are revealed in this image of Pluto’s largest moon Charon taken by New Horizons on July 11, 2015. The annotated version includes a diagram showing Charon’s north pole, equator, and central meridian, with the features highlighted. Credits: NASA/JHUAPL/SWRI — A new photo of Charon, too! Chasms, craters, and a dark north polar region are revealed in this image of Pluto’s largest moon taken by New Horizons on July 11, 2015. The annotated version includes a diagram showing Charon’s north pole, equator, and central meridian, with the features highlighted. The prominent crater is about 60 miles (96 km) across; the chasms appear to be geological faults.
Credits: NASA/JHUAPL/SWRI

Fasten your seat belts — we’re in for an exciting ride.

We’ll be reporting on results and sharing photos from the flyby here at Universe Today, but you’ll also want to check out NASA’s live coverage on NASA TV, its website and social media.

Monday, July 13
10:30 a.m. to noon – Media briefing on mission status and what to expect broadcast live on NASA TV

Tuesday, July 14
7:30 to 8 a.m. – Arrival at Pluto! Countdown program on NASA TV

At approximately 7:49 a.m., New Horizons is scheduled to be as close as the spacecraft will get to Pluto, approximately 7,800 miles (12,500 km) above the surface, after a journey of more than 9 years and 3 billion miles. For much of the day, New Horizons will be out of communication with mission control as it gathers data about Pluto and its moons.

The moment of closest approach will be marked during a live NASA TV broadcast that includes a countdown and discussion of what’s expected next as New Horizons makes its way past Pluto and potentially dangerous debris.

8 to 9 a.m. – Media briefing, image release on NASA TV

Wednesday, July 15

3 to 4 p.m. – Media Briefing: Seeing Pluto in a New Light; live on NASA TV and release of close-up images of Pluto’s surface and moons, along with initial science team reactions.

We’ll have the latest Pluto photos for you, but you can also check these excellent sites:

* Long Range Reconnaissance Imager (LORRI) archive
* Pluto Photojournal
* New Horizons science photo gallery

Need more Pluto? Spend a few minutes watching this excellent New York Times mission documentary.

May 29, 2015December 23, 2015 by Jason Major

Cassini to Perform Its Final Flyby of Hyperion

Enhanced-color image of Hyperion from Sept. 26, 2005. (NASA/JPL/SSI)

On Sunday, May 31, the Cassini spacecraft will perform its last close pass of Hyperion, Saturn’s curiously spongelike moon. At approximately 9:36 a.m. EDT (13:36 UTC) it will zip past Hyperion at a distance of about 21,000 miles (34,000 km) – not its closest approach ever but considerably closer (by 17,500 miles/28,160 km) than it was when the image above was acquired.*

This will be Cassini’s last visit of Hyperion. It will make several flybys of other moons within Saturn’s equatorial plane over the course of 2015 before shifting to a more inclined orbit in preparation of the end phase of its mission and its operating life in 2017.

At 255 x 163 x 137 miles (410 x 262 x 220 km) in diameter, Hyperion is the largest of Saturn’s irregularly-shaped moons. Researchers suspect it’s the remnant of a larger body that was blown apart by an impact. Hyperion’s craters appear to have a “punched-in” look rather than having been excavated, and have no visible ejecta or secondary craters nearby.

Impactors tend to make craters by compressing the surface material, rather than blasting it out. (NASA/JPL/SSI. Edit by J. Major.) — Impacts on Hyperion tend to “punch in” the surface material, rather than blasting it out. (NASA/JPL/SSI. Edit by J. Major.)

Hyperion orbits Saturn in an eccentric orbit at a distance of over 920,000 miles (1.48 million km)…that’s almost four times the distance our Moon is from us! This distance – as well as constant gravitational nudges from Titan – prevents Hyperion from becoming tidally locked with Saturn like nearly all of its other moons are. In fact its rotation is more of haphazard tumble than a stately spin, making targeted observations of any particular regions on its surface virtually impossible.

Images from the May 31 flyby are expected to arrive on Earth 24 to 48 hours later.

As small as it is Hyperion is Saturn’s eighth-largest moon, although it appears to be very porous and has a density half that of water. Read more about Hyperion here and see more images of it from Cassini here and here.

Source: NASA

*Cassini did come within 310 miles (500 km) of Hyperion on Sept. 26, 2005, but the images to make up the view above were acquired during approach.

UPDATE June 1, 2015: the raw images from Cassini’s flyby have arrived on Earth, check out a few below. (Looks like Cassini ended up with the same side of Hyperion again!)