{"id":94063,"date":"2020-10-21T09:08:00","date_gmt":"2020-10-21T06:08:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/en.buradabiliyorum.com\/nasa-lands-spacecraft-on-asteroid-bennu\/"},"modified":"2020-10-21T09:08:00","modified_gmt":"2020-10-21T06:08:00","slug":"nasa-lands-spacecraft-on-asteroid-bennu","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/nasa-lands-spacecraft-on-asteroid-bennu\/","title":{"rendered":"#NASA lands spacecraft on asteroid Bennu"},"content":{"rendered":"

“#NASA lands spacecraft on asteroid Bennu<\/strong>”
\n<\/p>\n

\n A NASA spacecraft on Tuesday touched down on an asteroid that scientists believe could hold the building blocks of life.<\/p>\n

The craft, OSIRIS-REx, successfully landed on the asteroid dubbed \u201cBennu\u201d more than four years after being launched from Earth.<\/p>\n

The van-sized machine quickly managed to fulfill its primary mission of collecting almost two ounces worth of samples before lifting off again, according to CNN<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cAfter over a decade of planning, the team is overjoyed at the success of today\u2019s sampling attempt,\u201d\u00a0Dante Lauretta, the principal investigator of the mission said.<\/p>\n

NASA confirmed the touchdown<\/a> around 6:10 p.m. on Tuesday while live-tweeting and using CGI animation to show the OSIRIS-REx\u2019s decent.<\/p>\n

\u201cEven though we have some work ahead of us to determine the outcome of the event \u2014 the successful contact, the TAGSAM gas firing, and back-away from Bennu are major accomplishments for the team.\u201d<\/p>\n

Bennu, which is more than 200 million miles away from the Earth and as tall as the Empire State Building, has attracted scientific attention due to the presence of carbon-bearing materials \u2014 a key building block of life \u2014 on the asteroid\u2019s surface.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe fact that we safely and successfully touched the surface of Bennu, in addition to all the other milestones this mission has already achieved, is a testament to the living spirit of exploration that continues to uncover the secrets of the solar system,\u201d said Lori Glaze, director of the Planetary Science<\/a> Division at NASA headquarters in Washington.<\/p>\n

The OSIRIS-REx is expected to remain orbiting Bennu until 2021 and then return to Earth with its samples in 2023.\n <\/p><\/div>\n