Sunday, December 16, 2012

It can't be that hard to get astronauts there

Apparently the business of asteroid fly-bys is pretty decent. The U.S. has done it, the Japanese have done it (even bringing back little flecks of one), and now the Chinese have flown by the bi-lobed Toutatis.  Given that it seems relatively easy to rendesvous with a near-Earth asteroid, why don't we just figure out how to get some astronauts onto one?

I pride myself in keeping track of these kinds of missions, and I have to admit that I didn't know they were doing this until I read the article. But I did know this satellite was imaging the moon. Apparently they jumped from a Lagrange point into the intercept orbit.

Deep space fly-by:  incredible pictures of Toutatis 4.5 million miles from Earth

And they came in really close, approximately two miles according to the article. Good nav.

Now Toutatis is more than just shadowy radar images.

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