The asteroid entered orbit with altitude of 680 metres.
NASA’s OSIRIS-REx on June 12 reached a very low steady orbit of the asteroid Bennu. As reported on the website of the mission, at this point the apparatus is rotated at an altitude of 680 meters from the surface of a celestial body.
Thus, OSIRIS-REx broke its own altitude record at Bennu: it was previously in orbit with a height of 1.3 km. Moreover, no interplanetary station was not working to so close to the surface of a celestial body’s orbit.
Coming into a new orbit, the unit began a new phase of its mission, called Orbital B. He will stay in this orbit until the second week of August, and then again rises to a height of 1.3 km. The team uses the data obtained during Orbital B, in order to assess the safety of sampling in each selected point.
The unit will also address mapping of the asteroid and study its composition of the surface layer of Bennu using the on-Board spectrometers.
