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Hayabusa Probe Arrives at Destination
david.given writes "The Japanese space probe Hayabusa has just arrived at its destination, the asteroid Itokawa, and is taking pictures. The largely autonomous ion-drive powered vehicle was launched in 2003 and was supposed to have arrived last year, but a solar flare damaged the solar panels causing a reduction in power. It will study the asteroid for two months before collecting a sample from the surface and departing for Earth, which it should reach in 2007. It's a pity that NASA's asteroid rover, which Hayabusa was going to drop off, got cancelled due to budgetry constraints..."
Attempts such as this do raise questions, that I am hoping scientists have already researched and are protecting against. We don't want any scientific research to cause issues here on Earth.
As happened in Andromeda Strain, hopefully the contents of this asteroid, that Hayabusa brings back to Earth, will not have any harmful bacteria or organisms present, that could cause great harm to life on Earth. I know this may sound like a conspiracy therory, but we have no clue what other elements exist outside of our small planet. There are so many others out there in the galaxies and universes, and we are such a miniscule part of things.
Hayabusa taking longer then expected is kind of ironic though, considering that a Hayabusa is one of the fastest production sport bikes available for sale today. I guess space travel and land travel are two different categories, but hopefully this ion drive engine will be great technology for future missions to space.
It is nice to see such engineering technologies being created for space travel, which hopefully can be applied to manned missions to other planets, as well as ways for energy efficient travel on Earth potentially being created.
It is too bad, that NASA didn't include a rover on this mission, would have been nice to explore and perform more testing on surface composition and the like... yet as always, budgets are never there for real research, but always there for wasted efforts in other areas...
Lets stand by and see some of these beautiful pictures sure to come from this probe...
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That wasn't flamebait. You want to see flamebait? G E O R G E B U S H is flamebait!
"Our interests are to see if we can't scale it up to something more exciting," he said.
> HAYABUSA is traveling through space using an ion engine.
Well f*** me! I thought that kind of sh** was still on the drawing board!
When can I go rent a sleeping pod in a space station?
Sh**, I can do that too, now? $20 million and dropping?
Ok, next question. Where's the sexbot?
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> Hayabusa arrived [at asteroid] Itokawa
Go USA!
- The scientific observation will be conducted for about two months including sampling and topographic measurement.
- It will orbit the asteroid, land on it, and bring back a sample from its surface.
- HAYABUSA employs a new technology - the ion engine
- Autonomous Navigation System, which enables the probe to approach a far-away asteroid without human guidance.
- It will also employ a hopping robot, which can move around on the asteroid's surface.
USA! USA! USA! Our technological superiority is the envy of the world!
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