Monday’s Astronomy Picture of the Day is of asteroid Itokawa, which is currenlty being examined by a Japanese spacecraft named Hayabusa. This is a fascinating mission which involves a sample return, but that’s not why I’m writing this…
Take a look at the image. The asteroid is nubbly! No craters! No smooth surface! It looks like you can see rocks and stuff all piled up! Way stinking cool!
Here are images from the Japanese Space Agency site. If you can read the japanese, you can translate for me. Look at the smooth surfaces next to the rocky nubbs. Wow.
I assume the Japanese page is talking about landing sites for Hayabusa. It looks that way anyhow.
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