Wednesday, June 16, 2010

Hayabusa returns!

Here is a short youtube video of the re-entry of Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency's Hayabusa capsule. This spectacular finish to a mission that started in 2003 to visit and sample the near-Earth asteroid, Itokawa, and return those samples to Earth. Hayabusa was also a test bed to research several new engineering technologies such as electrical drive engines and autonomous navigation plus many new technologies for retrieving and returning samples to Earth. Hayabusa is the first craft to visit, land on an asteroid and return to Earth.


from boing boing

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