A Robot's Shadow on Asteroid Itokawa

[iceman]

Nice APOD pic (http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap051116.html) today, showing the shadow of the Hyabusa spacecraft on the asteroid Itokawa.

It's going to land on the asteroid later this month, and the return capsule will be landing in Australia!

Will this be the first time that samples have been returned to Earth?

hmm I remember the comet mission (gemini?) that collected some dust but failed on the re-entry and got all smashed up over the Las Vegas desert..

What will they be looking for in the samples? What will they find?

[RapidEye]

I'm guessing they'll find that dang brown sock of mine that dissapeared in the drier last month! :nerd:

[RB]

Wow what a shot.
Thanks Mike.

[Greg Bryant]

Hi Mike,

It will be the first asteroid samples to be returned to Earth. Besides the lunar sample returns of the 1960s/70s, there's also the Stardust probe that's returning to Earth next January, with captured comet particles (and some interstellar dust too).

The failed re-entry mission from 2004 was the Genesis probe (although some particles have been recovered from it!)