NASA's space mission OSIRIS-REx will Return To Earth on September 22 before flying towards Asteroid Bennu, CNN reported. The spacecraft will come closer to Earth and skywatchers will have one last opportunity to take photographs of the probe.
NASA said that OSIRIS-REx will fly at the height of 11,000 miles above Earth's surface. The spacecraft will make its closest approach over Antartica near Cape Horn, Chile, 12:52 p.m. eastern time, according to News18.
OSIRIS-REx will take momentum from the Earth's gravity
According to NASA's statement, OSIRIS-REx will gain momentum from an Earth gravity assist and move towards asteroid Bennu (a type B carbonaceous asteroid with an approximate diameter of about 492 meters) to match its direction and speed.
The navigation team leader of Osiris-Rex is Michael Moreau and he said that "We’re essentially stealing a bit of the Earth’s momentum as we go by."
The probe will be traveling at a speed of 19,000 miles per hour to match its trajectory with the tilted orbit of asteroid Bennu, New York Times reported on Thursday. NASA launched this space mission on September 8, 2016, to study the asteroid Bennu near Earth and collect samples from it. The probe will arrive at the asteroid in August 2018 and will be studying it for many months. It will destroy the asteroid with nitrogen and use the robot arm to collect the dust samples and bring them to Earth in 2023.
How to see the probe?
On September 2, Arizona's Binocular Telescope snapped the tiny images of OSIRIS-REx when it was about seven million miles away from Earth.
NASA said that amateur astronomers and observatories would be able to see the spacecraft by using ground-based telescopes and encouraged them to share their photographs with the space agency.
Observers can submit their photographs at asteroidmission.org by following some instructions which are given at the mission website. Observers from Australia have a good opportunity to take a good shot of the spacecraft as it comes closer to Earth.
The JAXA (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency) will capture the images of OSIRIS-REx together with the Planetary Society of Japan and the Japan Public Observatory Society from various places in Japan. Observers can join the celebration of the close approach by the spacecraft on social media by snapping their photo with OSIRIS-REx from anywhere in the world and post it using hashtag #HelloOSIRISREx.