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A new video released by the European Space Agency (ESA) on Monday (June 27) shows the crater-riddled surface of the solar system’s smallest planet, Mercury, taken during an ultra-close flyby of the BepiColombo spacecraft.
BepiColombojoint mission of ESA and the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA), currently on a seven-year domestic cruise solar systemusing the gravity of the planets, including Mercury, Venus as well as Earth slow down so he can get in Mercuryorbit in 2025.
The Mercury flyby on Thursday (June 23) was BepiColombo’s second flyby of the scorched, rocky planet that will be its final destination. Just like during first meeting, which occurred on October 1, 2021, the probe approached the planet at an extremely close distance of only 120 miles (200 kilometers). This is closer than the two orbiters that make up the BepiColombo mission will orbit the planet after they arrive.
Connected: The BepiColombo spacecraft flew past Venus on its long journey to Mercury
The video, released by the ESA, combines 56 images taken by the spacecraft’s three low-resolution surveillance cameras over a 15-minute period shortly after the probe’s closest approach to the planet. The first image was taken at a distance of 572 miles (920 km), and the sequence ends with BepiColombo at a distance of 3,790 miles (6,099 km) from the planet.
Since BepiColombo approached Mercury from the night side, the spacecraft could not photograph the planet at its closest approach. However, other instruments aboard the two orbiters were switched on, measuring sunny wind in the area of the spacecraft. The solar wind is a stream of charged particles emitted by the Sun that flows through the entire solar system, causing space weather phenomena on Earth and other planets.
The two orbiters travel in space mounted on top of the transport module, so their high-resolution imaging devices are hidden and cannot be used during the flight phase.
The new images show many geological features, including numerous craters, volcanic flats and tectonic cliff-like fissures. Among the craters captured by the spacecraft is Caloris Planitia, the largest impact basin on Mercury and one of the largest in the entire solar system. The 960 miles (1550 km) wide crater was formed by a giant asteroid at least 60 miles (100 km) in diameter. For comparison, according to scientists, Asteroid Chicxulub which led to the extinction of the dinosaurs about 66 million years ago, was only 6 miles (10 km) wide.
BepiColombo is only the second mission in history to orbit Mercury, and the third to photograph it. The planet is notoriously difficult to reach because any spacecraft heading into the inner solar system must constantly brake against the planet’s gravitational pull. sun. Therefore, the mission engineers mapped a long and winding trajectory that passes through several celestial bodies, gravity of which slows down the spacecraft.
NASA Envoy the mission studied Mercury between 2011 and 2015. The probe observed a number of mysterious phenomena, including the amazing a magnetic field and existence ice in shaded craters around the planet’s poles. This ice persists in these regions, despite the fact that temperatures in the sun-exposed parts of the planet can reach a relentless 800 degrees Fahrenheit (420 degrees Celsius). BepiColombo aims to shed more light on the mysteries of the planet.
NASA was the first probe to photograph Mercury. Mariner 10, which made three flybys of the planet in the early 1970s while in orbit around the sun. BepiColombo’s next flyby of Mercury will take place in about a year. Meanwhile, next month, BepiColombo will get as close to the sun as possible.
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