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NASA’s OSIRIS-REx Spacecraft Enters Into Orbit Around Asteroid Bennu

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According to a report by Geek.com, one day before NASA's New Horizons made its historic flyby of Ultima Thule, the space agency broke another cosmic record. On December 31st, OSIRIS-REx entered into orbit around the asteroid Bennu, the smallest object ever to be circled by a spacecraft. Dante Lauretta, principal project investigator at the University of Arizona, Tucson, said in a statement, “The team continued our long string of successes by executing the orbit-insertion maneuver perfectly." OSIRIS-REx was reportedly launched in September of 2016, and has been inching closer to the planetoid for over two years, before it eventually landed on the asteroid last month. Geek.com reports that the ship is scheduled to circle the asteroid through the middle of February at a leisurely 62 hours per orbit.

Added on the 02/01/2019 13:28:44 - Copyright : Wochit

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