Earth is about to receive its first delivery of asteroid samples – BGR

• Japan’s JAXA space program has its Hayabusa2 probe headed for Earth and is approaching the sample release point.
• The spacecraft orbited the space rock called Ryugu, shot it with a bullet, and snatched a sample before returning to Earth.
• NASA’s asteroid sample return mission is also about to return to our planet.

Lately, all eyes have been on NASA’s OSIRIS-REx asteroid probe as it performed the touch-and-go operation to protect a sample of the Bennu space rock, but it’s not the only asteroid sampling mission currently being conducted. JAXA, the Japanese space agency, beat NASA on time with its Hayabusa2 mission which visited the asteroid Ryugu, “bombarded” it with bullets and collected its own samples.

Now, about a year after leaving Ryugu, the JAXA probe is approaching Earth and ready to deliver its incredibly valuable cargo. At present, the Hayabusa2 it should drop its protected container of asteroid material towards Earth on December 6, and is expected to land in Woomera, Australia, where enthusiastic scientists await.

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Like NASA’s OSIRIS-REx mission, the Hayabusa2 probe’s goal was to investigate its target asteroid and then collect a sample. He managed to achieve his goals with flying colors. To have a better opportunity to recover a new sample of the asteroid’s material, the probe was released as a kind of self-igniting “cannon” that blew up a crater in Ryugu. Eventually, Hayabusa2 managed to collect about 100 mg of material from the asteroid.

It might seem like a small amount – and, if we’re honest, it is – but we’re talking about material from a space rock whizzing around the Sun. Not much of it is needed to conduct a scientific investigation of what it contains, and the scientists hope it contains some very tantalizing secrets about the asteroid’s formation and others like it, and perhaps even a hint of how the building blocks of life got to Earth.

The tweet announcing the upcoming delivery was sent via the official Hayabusa2 Twitter account:

A message from Prime Minister Tsuda: “We are now on a landing route to Earth. Altitude will now gradually decrease towards Woomera. Fasten your seat belt securely and if you are traveling with small children, help them. The direction of approach to landing is programmed to be 1-5-0 “

The asteroid samples will be of great interest to scientists, and combined with the asteroid material collected by the OSIRIS-REx spacecraft, it may not be long before we learn many very interesting things about the space rocks that populate our solar system. In the meantime, however, we will have to wait and hope that the sample delivery goes as planned.

Mike Wehner has been reporting on technology and video games for the past decade, covering the latest news and trends in VR, wearables, smartphones and the technology of the future. Most recently, Mike worked as a Tech Editor at The Daily Dot and has appeared on USA Today, Time.com, and countless other websites and in print. His love of the news is second only to his addiction to games.