Merkuriukselta löydetty pieni kuu

[Jarmo]

Eilen otetussa kuvassa Merkuriukselta on löydetty pieni 70-metrinen kuu. Messenger-luotain kiihdytetään polttamalla koko jäljellä oleva polttoaine kerralla pois ja törmäytetään kuuhun. Tämä riittää laskelmien mukaan irroittamaan kuun Merkuriuksen painovoimakentästä ja siirtämään sen ainakin lähemmäs Maapalloa.

Lisää: http://messenger.jhuapl.edu/gallery/sciencePhotos/image.php?gallery_id=2&image_id=811

"The first evidence that Mercury has a small natural satellite or moon [...] approximately 70 meters in diameter and orbits Mercury at a mean distance of 14,300 km. A proposal to name the moon "Caduceus," after the staff carried by the Roman god Mercury [...]
[...]
MESSENGER Project Manager Burt Panini held an emergency meeting
[...]
the new plan is to use the remaining propellant to crash MESSENGER into Caduceus. "Our detailed analysis tells us that if we act now, and with the right trajectory, MESSENGER will impart just enough momentum to the moon to break it free of Mercury's gravity well and set it on an Earth-crossing trajectory suitable for recovery as a Mercury meteorite", said Panini.
[...]
We have designed a trajectory that will bring the moon to Earth at a remote location on the Wilkes Land ice sheet in Antarctica. This trajectory will avoid all population centers and will put the moon's impact site within reach for retrieval by the scientific staff at the U.S.-operated McMurdo Station."
[...]
Moreover, it will serve as the basis for a new Discovery-class mission proposal currently in development by the Applied Psychics Laboratory for a Mercury lander mission for in situ X-ray analysis of surface composition. That mission is to be named the Hermean On-surface Analysis with X-rays [HOAX]."

Jarmo

[Timi]

Huhtikuun 1.päivä...