NASA has expanded the mission of the Orisis-Rex spacecraft: the probe, which will return home with samples collected from the asteroid Bennu, will also travel to the asteroid Apophis, which will approach Earth three times by 2068.
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The U.S. Space Agency (NASA) announced Tuesday that its spacecraft, which collected samples from the asteroid Bennu in 2020, has been given a new name and mission: the OSIRIS-APophis EXplorer (Osiris-Apex) has been redirected to the asteroid Apophis, which is 2029 meters in diameter. it approaches the Earth at 32,000 kilometers.
Osiris-Apex is in orbit around the space rock as it passes by Earth and tries to examine the S-type asteroid as closely as possible.
The new task of the spacecraft is to study the changes that are taking place in the asteroid due to the approach of the Earth, and with its engines it is trying to remove and study the dust and tiny rock on and below the surface of Apophis.
NASA has also announced that it will extend the mission of its eight space probes.
The missions of Mars Odyssey, Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, MAVEN, Mars Science Laboratory (Curiosity), InSight Landing Unit, Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter, Osiris-Rex, and New Horizons will continue if the devices remain operational.
The duration of most missions will be extended by three years, and InSight will continue to operate until the end of 2022, unless the space probe’s power supply lasts even longer.
Lori Glaze, director of NASA’s planetary division in Washington, said
by extending them, they can make better use of NASA’s large-scale space missions and carry out research at a much lower cost than a new mission would cost.
The asteroid Apophis, first spotted in 2004, will approach Earth three times in the next hundred years, in 2029, 2036, and 2068. NASA estimates that the asteroid will not collide with Earth.
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