A View You’d See From An Asteroid’s Surface!

A view you’d see from an asteroid’s surface!

Japan’s space agency (JAXA) has successfully landed two small rovers on the asteroid Ryugu. Their “mothership” Hayabusa 2 reached the asteroid in summer at a distance of 313 million km (194 million miles) from Earth, a journey which took 3.5 years. Rover-1B captured this video of 15 frames on September 23, 2018. 

Another spectacular sight was the Hayabusa 2 spacecraft’s shadow visible on the surface before releasing the rovers:  

The mission’s goal is to study this potentially hazardous asteroid, and bring back a sample in 2020! Asteroids are not only space rocks that might collide with our planet, though. They are remnants from our solar system’s formation and help to investigate the origin of life and the Earth’s oceans.

⭐ Stay connected with Sci-universe on Tumblr and Instagram 📸: JAXA / Roman Tkachenko via @haya2e_jaxa