German Aerospace Center (DLR)
JAXA/U Tokyo/Kochi U/Rikkyo U/Nagoya U/ Chiba Inst Tech/Meiji U/U Aizu/AIST (links); MASCOT/DLR/JAXA (rechts).
Numerous boulders, many rocks, no dust: MASCOT's zigzag course across the asteroid Ryugu
12 Oct 2018, 08:40 UTC
Six minutes of free fall, a gentle impact on the asteroid and then 11 minutes of rebounding until coming to rest. That is how, in the early hours of 3 October 2018, the journey of the MASCOT asteroid lander began on Asteroid Ryugu – a land full of wonder, mystery and challenges.