Free Astronomy Magazine November-December 2018

NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2018 To give an idea of the criticality of that ren- dezvous, the JAXA technicians said that it was like centering a target 6 cm wide in Brazil shooting from Japan. Commenting on the exploit, the project manager Yuichi Tsuda said: “Today, we are at the begin- ning of a space science exploration that is unprecedented for humankind. Together with all of you, we have become the first eyewitnesses to see asteroid Ryugu. I feel this amazing honor as we proceed with the mission operations” . While mapping the surface, Hayabusa2 fur- ther approached Ryugu to deploy its load as scheduled, until it was, on September 21 st , just 55 meters away. On that day, the probe released and pushed towards the as- teroid the first two hopping rovers, Rover- 1A and Rover-1B. Thanks to the weak gravity exerted by Ryugu on the robotic