tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2877698188774561460.post5626929810684406580..comments2023-11-06T17:59:14.655+02:00Comments on Eco R Geo: NASA's Messenger Will Crash Into Mercury (video YT)antixronoshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17321757470762094126noreply@blogger.comBlogger1125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2877698188774561460.post-77972176582397803942015-04-30T21:56:42.424+03:002015-04-30T21:56:42.424+03:00NASA spacecraft smashes into Mercury...
NASA'...NASA spacecraft smashes into Mercury...<br /><br />NASA's Messenger spacecraft has crashed into the planet Mercury after running out of fuel, in an incident expected by the US space agency.<br /><br />On Thursday, Messenger - which stands for 'Mercury Surface, Space Environment, Geochemistry, and Ranging' - slipped out of orbit following a successful four-year tour of the rocky planet.<br /><br />NASA said it was powerless to stop gravity from dragging the spacecraft towards the planet.<br /><br />Its collision at a speed of more than 14,000kph added another small crater to Mercury's already-pitted surface.<br /><br />Mercury is only slightly bigger than our moon and is the closest planet to the Sun, but until the $450m spacecraft arrived in Mercury's orbit in 2011, little was known about the planet.<br /><br />Since then, the 485kg spacecraft has been using its seven scientific instruments to scan and feed back to Earth volumes of data.<br /><br />"The material that Messenger has sent is enormous," says Francisco Diego, Senior Research Fellow at the Department of Physics and Astronomy at University College London.<br /><br />"There are a lot of spectroscopic measurements, different gamma ray, x-ray spectrometers that characterised different depths of the soil of Mercury.".....aljazeera.com<br />30/4/15Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com