Asteroid ItokawaIt was on a mission to bring back the world’s first rock samples from an asteroid. Yes, it was, as the Japanese space probe failed to touch down on Sunday on its target nearly 300 million km (186 million miles) from earth. But, scientists from the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) seem to be diligent enough not to lose heart even after multiple failures. They were trying to pinpoint the location of the probe and considering a second attempt at landing. While approaching Itokawa, Hayabusa suffered a communications glitch and, by the time the link was re-established with Earth several hours later, it drifted away from its target. The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) had no other option, but to wait until the spacecraft’s high gain antenna was pointed back towards Earth before it could say for certain whether Hayabusa had landed as hoped.



Via: New Scientist