great news for JAXA
During the three-hour loss of communication between the Hayabusa probe and mission control in Japan, the probe successfully landed on Itokawa. Although Hayabusa did not retrieve a sample on that attempt, I view this as a very positive sign.
Had the probe not landed on the asteroid, then this Friday's attempt would have a lower probability of success. As it was, the probe not only safely landed and took off again 30 minutes later (the first time any spacecraft has done this on an asteroid), it also did so completely on its own, without any human oversight. This speaks volumes about the programming done by the Japanese.
So, even if something goes wrong again on Friday and ground operators lose contact with the spacecraft again, it has a good chance of successfully completing its mission.
Technorati Tags: Space, Asteroids
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