Japan shows photos of asteroid crater after probe fired projectile

The Japanese space agency JAXA has published photos of the crater formed on an asteroid after the Hayabusa2 spacecraft fired a missile at the asteroid early this month.

JAXA reports on Twitter The exact dimensions and shape of the artificially created crater will be investigated in more detail in the future, but the space agency already reports that an area of ​​​​about 20 meters has been changed by the impact. JAXA said it did not expect such a big change.

The photos are proof that a crater was actually formed by the impact. This event took place early this month. The Hayabusa2 probe then fired the so-called Small Carry-on Impactor, one of the probe’s modules, onto the surface of asteroid 1999 JU3 Ryugu.

There were already photos showing the module’s ejector hitting the surface of Ryugu, but there was no definitive evidence of cratering. Jaxa also had a a few days ago video published showing the impactordescending on a collision course with the asteroid.

The spacecraft is planned to land on the asteroid to pick up the material from the crater and eventually take it back to Earth for research. The probe is expected to arrive here in December 2020. Incidentally, the probe has already landed and taken off from the asteroid before, in an attempt to collect material.

On the left the location of the impact before the actual impact, next to it the result after the impact.