NASA’s Lucy spacecraft preparing for its first asteroid flyby

NASA’s Lucy spacecraft is making ready for its first close-up take a look at an asteroid. On Nov. 1, it’s going to fly by asteroid Dinkinesh and check its devices in preparation for visits within the subsequent decade to a number of Trojan asteroids that circle the sun in the identical orbit as Jupiter.

Dinkinesh, lower than half a mile, or 1 kilometer, huge, circles the sun in the primary belt of asteroids positioned between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter. Lucy has been visually monitoring Dinkinesh since Sept. 3; will probably be the primary of 10 asteroids Lucy will go to on its 12-year voyage. To look at so many, Lucy won’t cease or orbit the asteroids, as an alternative it’s going to gather knowledge because it speeds previous them in what known as a “flyby.”

“That is the primary time Lucy will probably be getting an in depth take a look at an object that, up so far, has solely been an unresolved smudge in one of the best telescopes,” mentioned Hal Levison, Lucy principal investigator from the Southwest Analysis Institute, which is headquartered in San Antonio. “Dinkinesh is about to be revealed to humanity for the primary time.”

The first intention of the Lucy mission, which launched Oct. 16, 2021, is to survey the Jupiter Trojan asteroids, a never-before-explored inhabitants of small our bodies that orbit the sun in two “swarms” that lead and comply with Jupiter in its orbit. Nonetheless, earlier than Lucy will get to the Trojans, it’s going to fly by one other important belt asteroid in 2025 known as Donaldjohanson for added in-flight assessments of the spacecraft programs and procedures.

Throughout the Dinkinesh flyby, the workforce will check its terminal-tracking system that can permit the spacecraft to autonomously pinpoint the placement of the asteroid, maintaining it inside the devices’ field-of-view all through the encounter.

As this encounter is meant as a check of Lucy’s programs, scientific observations will probably be easier than for the mission’s important targets. The spacecraft and the platform that holds the devices will transfer into place two hours earlier than the closest approach to Dinkinesh. As soon as in place, the spacecraft will start accumulating knowledge with its high-resolution digital camera (L’LORRI) and its thermal-infrared digital camera (L’TES).

One hour earlier than closest method, the spacecraft will start monitoring the asteroid with the terminal-tracking system. Solely within the final eight minutes will Lucy have the ability to gather knowledge with MVIC and LEISA, the colour imager and infrared spectrometer that comprise the L’Ralph instrument. Lucy’s closest method is anticipated to happen at 12:54 p.m. EDT, when the spacecraft will probably be inside 270 miles (430 kilometers) of the asteroid. Lucy will carry out steady imaging and monitoring of Dinkinesh for nearly one other hour. After that point, the spacecraft will reorient itself to renew communications with Earth however will proceed to periodically picture Dinkinesh with L’LORRI for the subsequent 4 days.

“We’ll know what the spacecraft ought to be doing always, however Lucy is so distant it takes about half-hour for radio signals to journey between the spacecraft and Earth, so we will not command an asteroid encounter interactively,” mentioned Mark Effertz, Lucy chief engineer at Lockheed Martin House in Littleton, Colorado. “As an alternative, we pre-program all of the science observations. After the science observations and flyby are full, Lucy will reorient its high-gain antenna towards Earth, after which it’s going to take practically half-hour for the primary sign to make it to Earth.”

After confirming the spacecraft’s well being, engineers will command Lucy to ship science knowledge of the encounter to Earth. This knowledge downlink will take a number of days.

Whereas the first objective of the Dinkinesh encounter is an engineering check, mission scientists hope to additionally use the captured knowledge to glean insights concerning the hyperlink between bigger important belt asteroids explored by earlier NASA missions and the smaller near-Earth asteroids.

After the Dinkinesh encounter, the Lucy spacecraft will proceed in its orbit across the sun, returning to the Earth’s neighborhood for its second gravity help in December 2024. This push from Earth will ship it again to the primary asteriod belt for its 2025 Donaldjohanson flyby, after which on to the Jupiter Trojan asteroids in 2027.