[neverdem]

JAXA Hayabusa

Unstable ground.
Hayabusa casts its shadow on the asteroid Itokawa, which it revealed to be a pile of boulders barely held together by its own gravity.
Credit: JAXA/Institute of Space and Aeronautical Science

[neverdem]

Floating Pile Of Rubble A Pristine Record Of Solar System's History

[ahayes]

I read these articles in Science yesterday. Weird and wonderful! I hope the robot made it away with some rocks.

[Bubba_Leroy]

Then it failed to fire its bulletlike probe into the surface, leaving researchers wondering if it had retrieved a sample or not

Doesn't sould like there is much to wonder about.

[KillTime]

Hmmm Looks like a lone Tie Fighter lost from its squadron.

[Reeses]

Japan is a sleeping superpower. Hayabusa was launched by a Japanese M-5 rocket, a design copied from America's Peacekeeper ICBM. From wikipedia:

There are concerns that the development of this three-stage solid fuel rocket, unusual for space exploration, is motivated by military concerns despite Japan’s non-nuclear policy. Solid fuel rockets are the design of choice for military applications as they can remain in storage for long periods, and then reliably launch at a moments notice.

[SunkenCiv]

Japanese asteroid team reports on ball of rubble - Itokawa
Reuters on Yahoo | 6/1/06 | Maggie Fox
Posted on 06/02/2006 1:21:27 AM EDT by NormsRevenge
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1642153/posts

[SunkenCiv]

Asteroid Juno Has A "Bite" Out Of It
SpaceDaily | Aug 11, 2003 | unattributed
Posted on 06/03/2006 2:16:51 AM EDT by SunkenCiv
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/1642711/posts

[Bloody Sam Roberts]

Three years ago, the Japanese spacecraft Hayabusa set out to fetch a bit of asteroid and return it to Earth, and last November, the little satellite set down on a 500-meter-long asteroid called Itokawa.

I read that first line from the article and it hit me like a ton of bricks:

It wasn't all that long ago that this type of thing was the stuff of Sci-Fi.

In fact, the first sentence from the above article reads like the opening of a science fiction novel.

We live in a fascinating age. It's a great time to be alive.

[RandallFlagg]

JAXA Hayabusa


Suzuki Hayabusa:

[SunkenCiv]

from 2006, an old topic, updating standard ping message. Found while looking for Clark Chapman refs on FR.

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