back to article NASA to begin first asteroid sample mission: Seeks 'pristine' specimen

NASA is preparing for its first mission that will see a spacecraft retrieve a “pristine sample” of an asteroid so that it can be studied on Earth. The Origins, Spectral Interpretation, Resource Identification, Security-Regolith Explorer (OSIRIS-REx) spacecraft will be launched on 8 September 7:05pm EDT (12:05 am BST) from Cape …

  1. DNTP

    Going to be worth it

    In the long term, the benefit to human civilization of an improved Yarkovsky effect model will be worth a heck of a lot more than the $800 million price tag (Note that this is completely aside from all the other scientific gains that could be realized from the mission). It will enable more accurate long-term prediction/tracking of potentially dangerous asteroids, allowing astronomers to focus their efforts on actual threats and potentially carry out diversion missions as early as possible. Early is cheaper, as anyone who has ever sent out a Kerbal team to shift a Class E rock surely knows.

  2. Named coward

    security-regolith? For a moment I thought they went really really overboard with the backronym. But it's actually "...Security. REgolith eXplorer"...which is still overdone, but only to the usual standards

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Coming from the US, I would expect a "REgime eXchanger". It will bombard the asteroid into submission, declare victory, then scoop up a large, fat sample while declaring that it will not "put boots on the ground".

      It then refuses to leave, possibly contacting the UN security council to demand that it look into why Russia is not being sanctioned for building similar missions.

  3. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Andromeda Strain

    'Space Flu', that's all we bleedin need!

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Andromeda Strain

      Justin in time for the next elections.

  4. Florida1920

    Take me along

    If I had it to do over, I might have gone into geology as a career. Always liked looking at road cuts and the like. Now my expiration date is approaching, sure would like to catch a ride on the OSIRIS-REx mission! First human to visit an asteroid in space? What a way to go.

    Note to editors: There's something missing from the article. It says Bennu is "about 1,900 feet long - roughly the size of five football fields." Okay, but we also need to know its volume in Olympic swimming pools.

    1. Midnight

      Re: Take me along

      Green or Blue swimming pools?

    2. Stoneshop
      Boffin

      Re: Take me along

      Mean radius: 246 ± 10 m -> 1.77 brontosaurus ± 71.42 linguine

      Equatorial radius 275 ± 10 m -> 1.99 brontosaurus ± 71.42 linguine

      Mass 6.0×10^10 kg to 7.76×10^10 kg -> 14285.714 to 18476.19 MJub

      And if we take Bennu to be spherical (it's not quite, so definitely not perfectly spherical and of uniform density, and by inference not a cow with those properties either), the mean radius gives 62356412.59 m^3, or 24913.987 Olympic swimming pools plus or minus about 62.52 Ranomi Kromowidjojos.

    3. Andy E

      Re: Take me along

      When it says 5 football pitches I presume they mean what the US folk call Soccer pitches. These can be anything from 90 to 120 meters in length. Five pitches could be 450 to 600 meters. The margin of error could be more than a football pitch. Oh....

      Can't we have something a bit more precise?

  5. Gene Cash Silver badge

    Have they double checked to see the accelerometer on the return capsule is installed right-way-up and we won't have another Genesis-style fiasco?

    Seriously though, I wish them all the luck.

    1. Annihilator

      Genesis-style fiasco

      Genesis has become a galactic controversy. Until the Federation Council makes policy, you are all under orders not to discuss with anyone your knowledge of Genesis. Consider it a quarantined planet... and a forbidden subject.

      1. Fatman
        Joke

        Re: Genesis-style fiasco

        <quote>Consider it a quarantined planet... and a forbidden subject.</quote>

        Now, here I have always thought that it was Talos IV that was quarantined.

  6. Tom 7

    Yarkovsky effect

    err isnt that pretty well accepted and understood? We have a huge amount of data on it from all the shit we have flying around up there.

    1. Stoneshop

      Re: Yarkovsky effect

      That flying shit tends to be man-made, couple of decades old at best, constructed of metals and fibreglass/carbon-fibre/ceramics and such, with sizes mostly ranging from dustbin to a couple of large fridges with half a tennis court strapped on. Bennu is of a different composition, quite a bit larger [eeeEEECHum] and it's been around since forever.

  7. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    We wouldnt need this

    If Bruce Willis hadnt died during the last mission to stop an impact.

    Such a waste...

    *tear rolls down cheek*

    Dont wanna close mah eyes...

    *sniff*

    Mumble fall asleep mumble Miss you babe...

    *Wipes tear*

    ARM is such a crap name as well...

    Whats wrong with:

    Awesome Earth Redeeming Orbital SMashy Interception Tool Hauler

  8. Annihilator
    Alien

    2010

    ALL THESE WORLDS

    ARE YOURS EXCEPT

    BENNU

    ATTEMPT NO

    LANDING THERE

    USE THEM TOGETHER

    USE THEM IN PEACE

    1. Fatman
      Go

      Re: 2010

      2016

      AFTER MORE THAN TWO CENTURIES OF PLANET WIDE DESTRUCTION

      WE HAVE FINALLY HAD ENOUGH

      YOUR WORLD NO LONGER BELONGS TO YOUR SPECIES

      HERE IS YOUR 'EVICTION NOTICE'

      YOU HAVE ONE CENTURY TO COMPLY

      ONCE YOU ARE GONE

      THEN PERHAPS YOUR PLANET WILL RETURN TO THE BEAUTIFUL PLANET IT ONCE WAS

      LEARN TO LIVE IN HARMONY WITH THE PLANET YOU TRAVEL TO

      OR ELSE YOU WILL BE ERADICATED AS A GALACTIC PEST

  9. The Nazz

    Why all that way and $800m for a puny two oh zees*

    Why not collect quite a bit more material? It's not like there's a baggage handling charge on the return journey.

    *As my millenial daughter once asked after her first Domestic Science lesson ( well, she called it Food Tech but i knew what she meant) and upon reading a recipe, "Dad, what are oz's?"

    I blame the teachers.

    *

  10. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    But...

    Will this help us defend against Nibiru?

  11. wsm

    Pristine

    If it's anything like their Mars missions, they'll blast the surface with retro rockets, then take their samples from the same spot.

    I suppose an asteroid crawler is a little beyond their capabilities at this time.

    1. Oliver Mayes

      Re: Pristine

      Asteroids have negligible gravity, no rockets needed for a soft landing. Just some soft thrusters.

    2. DNTP

      Re: Pristine

      One doesn't land on even a very large asteroid so much as one matches vector and velocity as close to it as possible, slowly drifts in under tiny gravitational forces, and then hopes not to bounce off hard enough to attain escape velocity.

      Philae, the ESA Rosetta comet lander, made its landing at ~100cm/sec and attained a velocity of 38cm/sec on its first (unintentional) bounce, which was 86% of the velocity that would have unrecoverably launched it away from the comet's surface.

      These are really gentle events.

  12. Faux Science Slayer

    "Absorb photons and emit heat".... What do you think HEAT is ?

    Any body with a temperature EMITS radiant energy photons....

    for humans with 98.6°F tempature, emission is 10 micron InfraRed photons....

  13. Winkypop Silver badge
    Thumb Up

    A great opportunity

    Let's also "Banksy" that sucker after we scrape it.

    Tagged!

  14. Axman

    It’s around 1,900 feet long - approximately the length of ninety five adult giraffes laid out head to feet. Adult giraffes require very little sleep so that if all the giraffes were landed on Bennu, and they optimised their sleep patterns so that as few as possible were nodding off together, on average eighty seven of them would be awake at any given moment.

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