A Japanese H-2A launcher blasted off from an idyllic island spaceport Tuesday, dispatching a daring six-year expedition to bring a piece of an asteroid back to Earth.
Japan is readying an H-2A rocket for liftoff Tuesday to kick off an audacious six-year roundtrip journey to a carbon-rich asteroid, drop a fleet of landers to its surface, collect primordial rock samples, and return the materials to terrestrial laboratories for analysis.
An ambitious mission of exploration launched from Japan at 0422 GMT Wednesday (11:22 p.m. EST Tuesday). An H-2A rocket lifted off from the Tanegashima Space Center with Hayabusa 2, starting a six-year journey to collect rocks from an asteroid and return them to Earth.
Poor weather at the Tanegashima Space Center in Japan has grounded until at least Wednesday the launch of a $300 million robotic mission to fly to an asteroid, pick up samples and return them to Earth.