Hayabusa 2 on its way back to earth

[YNM]

44 minutes ago, KG3 said:

If there were a single super Jupiter orbiting in a polar orbit the invariable plane might not be close to any of the objects in the system.

Yeah...

But as the total energy and angular momentum must stay the same,that got to be one hell of an event !

48 minutes ago, adsii1970 said:

But it is possible to set a retrograde orbit...

I'm fairly sure it's possible ?

 

Anyway, back to Ryugu, I guess one reason to choose to flip the image is to synchronize the visual with thermal (infrared, microwave) vision. It tends to be hotter at "afternoon" than at "morning", or at least such is the presumed case !

[adsii1970]

43 minutes ago, YNM said:

I'm fairly sure it's possible ?

I've done it in my planet mod. One of the planets orbits backwards...

[insert_name]

http://www.hayabusa2.jaxa.jp/en/news/status/

bringing this thread somewhat back on topic, low altitude ops are continueing, a minerva will be dropped on 9/26, and mascot on 10/3

[insert_name]

Thermal map of ryugu has been released

http://www.hayabusa2.jaxa.jp/en/topics/20180907e/

[insert_name]

Touchdown rehearsal aborted due to issue with lidar

http://www.hayabusa2.jaxa.jp/en/topics/20180912e/

[MaverickSawyer]

At least it aborted upon detecting the fault, instead of possibly crashing due to faulty information.

[cubinator]

39 minutes ago, MaverickSawyer said:

crashing

Honestly, would this even be a problem here? How fast could a free-falling object get before hitting the asteroid from that distance?

[kerbiloid]

Probably it could bounce like Philae did.

[MaverickSawyer]

9 hours ago, cubinator said:

Honestly, would this even be a problem here? How fast could a free-falling object get before hitting the asteroid from that distance?

Not terribly fast, but what happens if the landing is on one of the ion engines, and it stuffs regolith dust up into the engine? That's be a mission ending accident.

[cubinator]

1 hour ago, MaverickSawyer said:

Not terribly fast, but what happens if the landing is on one of the ion engines, and it stuffs regolith dust up into the engine? That's be a mission ending accident.

I see. Well, they seem to be resolving the issue anyway.

[insert_name]

Minerva drop is go for tommorow

https://twitter.com/haya2e_jaxa/status/1042225548699684864?ref_src=twsrc^tfw
 

Edited September 19, 2018 by insert_name

[insert_name]

more info on the hopper being dropped:

http://www.hayabusa2.jaxa.jp/en/topics/20180919e/ 

[insert_name]

Minerva II seperation confirmed

 

[insert_name]

Rovers have touched down, pictures were blurry due to motion of the spacecraft

http://www.hayabusa2.jaxa.jp/en/topics/20180922e/

[tater]

 

[DAL59]

This is a really cool website:

http://haya2now.jp/en.html

[LaydeeDem]

Might be too early to say it but Ryugu's surface looks to have similar properties to Lunar regolith. It's color seems to change depending on the angle of the sun, appearing brown at high sun angles and gray-ish at low sun angles. Probably not too surprising but it's neat!

[insert_name]

More pictures from the rovers, 1-b made a hop

http://www.hayabusa2.jaxa.jp/en/topics/20180927e_MNRV/

Highest resolution picture of ryugu yet

http://www.hayabusa2.jaxa.jp/en/topics/20180927e_HighestRes/

[cubinator]

Very cool! Seems like the team sacrificed a little image quality for the wide angle view, though...

[insert_name]

Mascot deployment underway

http://www.hayabusa2.jaxa.jp/en/topics/20181003e_MSC_info/

[MaverickSawyer]

They're getting close!

[KG3]

From the pictures I've seen so far it looks like there isn't any material smaller than pea stone.  Will they be able go sample such chunky stuff?  I thought their sampler was set up for very fine stuff.

[MaverickSawyer]

Good release! MASCOT was dropped at an altitude of 51 meters at 0157 UTC. MASCOT is communicating with Hayabusa.

[cubinator]

3 hours ago, KG3 said:

From the pictures I've seen so far it looks like there isn't any material smaller than pea stone.  Will they be able go sample such chunky stuff?  I thought their sampler was set up for very fine stuff.

There's rocks of all sizes there, I'm sure, including lots of those tiny dust particles you don't want to breathe in.

[kerbiloid]

If they can move they could show their traces.