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A spacecraft on an asteroid rock collection mission gathered so much material that it opened a door, allowing the rocks to be seen into space, officials with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) said Friday.
The Osiris-Rex had traveled around 320 million kilometers (200 million miles) to collect samples from Bennu, a skyscraper-sized asteroid, in the first mission of its kind for NASA.
The spacecraft reached its destination on Tuesday, briefly touching the asteroid with its robotic arm to collect rocks.
The sample container at the end of the arm penetrated so deeply into the asteroid and with such force that the rocks were sucked in and stuck around the edge of the container lid.
Scientists noted what had happened after the images from the spacecraft’s collection head returned to ground control.
“Honestly, we couldn’t have done a better collection experiment,” said the mission’s lead scientist, Dante Lauretta of the University of Arizona. “We are almost a victim of our own success here.”
The sampling was the first of its kind for NASA.
Running to stop more spills
The mishap caused the mission team to rush to put away the collection container to avoid additional spills. The team even decided to skip the additional sample measurement phase.
“Time is of the essence,” Thomas Zurbuchen, NASA associate science administrator, told reporters.
NASA won’t know how much material its probe has collected until the sample capsule returns in 2023.
“As you can imagine, that’s difficult … but the good news is we see a lot of material,” said Lauretta.
The requirement for the mission was to bring a minimum of 60 grams of the asteroid.
Read more: US-Russian crew returns to Earth from ISS
NASA’s first sample return mission
The approximately $ 800 million (€ 674 million) minivan-sized Osiris-Rex spacecraft, built by Lockheed Martin, launched in 2016 to collect and return the first American sample of pristine asteroid materials.
Japan is the only other country that has accomplished such a feat.
Asteroids are among the remnants of the formation of the solar system about 4.5 billion years ago. A sample could contain clues to the origins of life on Earth, scientists say.
kmm / dj (Reuters, AP)
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