NASA’s Lucy mission executed the primary of three deliberate slingshot maneuvers round Earth this month in preparation to check Jupiter’s Trojan asteroids, however the spacecraft made positive to take some beautiful images of Earth and the moon earlier than retreating into deep house.
The photographs, taken on Oct. 13 and Oct. 15 as Lucy started its strategy towards Earth for a gravity-assisted pace increase on Oct. 16, are extra useful than a few easy snapshots. The photographs have been taken to assist calibrate Lucy‘s Terminal Monitoring Digital camera (T2CAM) system, which options two similar cameras that the spacecraft will use to pinpoint and observe goal asteroids because it zips previous at excessive speeds.
The primary picture, taken on Oct. 13, highlights the unbelievable distance between the Earth and the moon. On the time, the 2 our bodies sitting at reverse edges of the body have been about 890,000 miles (1.4 million kilometers) away from Lucy, based on a NASA assertion. Mission personnel additionally supposed to have the spacecraft {photograph} the moon on its approach again into deep house.
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The second picture, snapped two days later, is a close-up shot of the Earth as Lucy approached, taken at a distance of roughly 380,000 miles (620,000 km). Within the picture, Hadar, Ethiopia, is simply seen on the left-most fringe of the planet, giving Lucy (and us) a cosmic-eye glimpse of the spot the place the three.2-million-year-old human ancestor fossil for which the mission is known as was found.
Lucy can be making three flybys of Earth in complete, utilizing Earth’s gravity on its strategy to hurry itself up so it could possibly begin its years-long voyage to Jupiter‘s Trojan asteroids. Through the first flyby, Lucy got here inside simply 220 miles (350 km) of the Earth’s floor — a decrease altitude than the Worldwide Area Station and plenty of satellites and shut sufficient for sharp-eyed skywatchers on the bottom beneath to identify it.
Lucy would be the first spacecraft to go to Jupiter’s Trojan asteroids, so named as a result of they orbit the solar on the identical distance as Jupiter, each in entrance of the planet and behind it. They occupy two of the 5 Lagrange factors of Jupiter, the one areas the place a secure orbit so near the gasoline large is feasible.
Throughout its 12-year mission, Lucy is about to fly by 9 asteroids, together with one in the principle asteroid belt, to check their composition, density and variety. Whereas that is a formidable variety of asteroids to check in a single go, there are as many as 12,000 Trojan asteroids orbiting with Jupiter, based on the Worldwide Astronomical Union. Scientists imagine these rocks are 4-billion-year-old “fossils” left over from the formation of the photo voltaic system.
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