The European Space Agency has shown off BepiColombo, a spacecraft containing a pair of Mercury orbiters that is expected to launch in October 2018 and arrive at Mercury in 2025:
After almost 20 years of development, the European Space Agency has finally unveiled the BepiColombo Mercury orbiters and confirmed the mission is on track for an October 2018 launch.
The 1.65-billion-euro mission, a joint venture between ESA and the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA), is Europe's first attempt to enter the orbit around scorching Mercury, the closest planet to the sun.
[...] The 4,100-kilogram BepiColombo consists of two orbiters that will launch together — the ESA-managed Mercury Planetary Orbiter (MPO) and the JAXA-owned Mercury Magnetospheric Orbiter (MMO). The two spacecraft will be delivered to the orbit around Mercury stacked on top of each other by the Mercury Transfer Module (MTM). During the seven-year journey, the MMO will be shielded from the sun by the MMO Sunshield and Interface Structure (MOSIF), which will also serve as a mechanical and electrical interface between the two orbiters.
[...] BepiColombo will cover some 8.9 billion kilometers on its journey to Mercury, which it is expected to reach in December 2025.
ESA said Bepi Colombo[sic] features a more complex design than NASA's Messenger that orbited Mercury between 2011 and 2015. Bepi Colombo is expected to provide higher-resolution imagery than Messenger, ESA said. However, its mission is only expected to last one year with a possible one-year extension.
Also at The Guardian.
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Update: Launch was successful.
The BepiColombo mission to Mercury is set for launch on Saturday, October 20. The spacecraft consists of two satellites which will eventually detach and settle into two separate orbits around Mercury:
BepiColombo is a joint mission of the European Space Agency (ESA) and the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) to the planet Mercury. The mission comprises two satellites to be launched together: the Mercury Planetary Orbiter (MPO) and Mio (Mercury Magnetospheric Orbiter, MMO). The mission will perform a comprehensive study of Mercury, including its magnetic field, magnetosphere, interior structure and surface. It is scheduled to launch in October 2018, with an arrival at Mercury planned for December 2025, after a flyby of Earth, two flybys of Venus, and six flybys of Mercury. The mission was approved in November 2009, after years in proposal and planning as part of the European Space Agency's Horizon 2000+ program; it will be the last mission of the program to be launched.
[...] The main objectives of the mission are:
- Study the origin and evolution of a planet close to its parent star
- Study Mercury as a planet—its form, interior, structure, geology, composition and craters
- Investigate Mercury's exosphere, composition and dynamics, including generation and escape
- Study Mercury's magnetised envelope (magnetosphere) - structure and dynamics
- Investigate the origin of Mercury's magnetic field
- Verify Einstein's theory of general relativity by measuring the parameters gamma and beta of the parameterized post-Newtonian formalism with high accuracy.
The first event will be an Earth flyby on April 6, 2020, followed by a Venus flyby on October 12, 2020. The spacecraft's first Mercury flyby will be on October 2, 2021.
Previously: ESA Shows off BepiColombo Mercury Orbiters Ahead of 2018 Launch
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 09 2017, @01:05AM (1 child)
I'm not a fan of this CamelCase name. At first I thought it was a cartoon character but it turns out to be a guys nickname + lastname:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BepiColombo [wikipedia.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 09 2017, @02:47AM
Nine gravity assists are planned for the mission, so it seems like a suitable name (apart from the camel casing).