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Boxy MASCOT lander plops itself down on asteroid Ryugu for a 16-hour survey
An artist’s conception shows the MASCOT lander sitting on the surface of the 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 16-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.”
MASCOT took a picture of its own shadow on Ryugu’s surface as it descended:
Hello #Earth, hello @haya2kun! I promised to send you some pictures of #Ryugu so here’s a shot I took during my descent. Can you spot my shadow? #AsteroidLanding pic.twitter.com/dmcilFl5ms
— MASCOT Lander (@MASCOT2018) October 3, 2018
The lander is equipped with a swing arm to move itself around the surface. It had to use the arm to relocate itself and get oriented properly to collect scientific data, mission managers said in a tweet.
MASCOT’s lifetime was limited because it’s powered by onboard lithium batteries. Once the power runs out, the probe is dead. It had only 16 hours to record observations with its four instruments — a camera, a radiometer, a magnetometer and a French-built infrared spectrometer — and upload the data to Hayabusa 2.
Tweets from the team indicated that the survey was going according to plan:
I’ve been on asteroid Ryugu for a little over 12 hours conducting experiments non-stop! Now I’m working with MicrOmega and MARA! #AsteroidLanding
— MASCOT Lander (@MASCOT2018) October 3, 2018
I’ve taken measurements with all my experiments, and my battery is holding up! Still going strong! #AsteroidLanding
— MASCOT Lander (@MASCOT2018) October 3, 2018
MASCOT’s mission was initiated almost two weeks after Hayabusa 2 deployed two mini-rovers to Ryugu’s surface for an initial round of reconnaissance. In the coming months, Hayabusa 2 will descend to the asteroid and blast bits of rock from the surface for collection. It also has another mini-rover to release.
The probe is scheduled to start the return journey to Earth next year and drop off its samples during a flyby in late 2020.
Check back for updates on MASCOT’s status.