Hayabusa Mission Topic

[orionrider]

The second they unscrew the lid is like when the hero cuts the blue wire on the A-bomb with the ticking huge LED counter :mrgreen:

Perfect moment for a commercial :twisted:

 

[EarthlingX]

http://www.jaxa.jp : Asteroid Explorer HAYABUSA (MUSES-C) on the Schedule of Opening the Sample Container

June 24, 2010 (JST)

Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA)

We announce that we will start opening the sample container of HAYABUSA on June 24, 2010 (Japan Standard Time) in the curation center (*1) at the JAXA Sagamihara Campus. It will take about one week to finish opening the sample container (*2).

Reentry Capsule of HAYABUSA


(*1) Curation Center : the facility that accepts samples and provides treatment and storage of the samples.
(*2) Sample container : A box inside the capsule where the samples are stored.

The curation operations are being carried out in cooperation with NASA.

 

[kg]

Why does it take so long to open the container? I find a few good raps on lid with a wooden spoon then on hard smack on the bottom of the jar with the palm of my hand loosens it right up! :lol:

Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA)
We announce that we will start opening the sample container of HAYABUSA .... It will take about one week to finish opening the sample container

 

[scottb50]

Why does it take so long to open the container? I find a few good raps on lid with a wooden spoon then on hard smack on the bottom of the jar with the palm of my hand loosens it right up! :lol:

Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA)
We announce that we will start opening the sample container of HAYABUSA .... It will take about one week to finish opening the sample container

Look's like you could just grab ahold of it and oops!

 

[Gregoire1960]

New version of an old joke: "How many JAXA scientists does it take to screw in a lightbulb?"

 

[JonClarke]

Lucky none of you clowns are actually involved with the actual mission. :x

 

[MeteorWayne]

^^^^^
What he said!

 

[scottb50]

^^^^^
What he said!

Abbot and Costello meet Hayabusa, I think I saw that movie.

 

[JonClarke]

New version of an old joke: "How many JAXA scientists does it take to screw in a lightbulb?"

I finbd this in extremely poor taste. "How many X does it take to screw in a lightbulb?" jokes are by their nature derogatory with respect to their targets. The same goes for other other comments of this ilk.

The JAX scientists and worked long and hard against extremely difficult odds to bring hayabusa home. They deserve every respect and every accolade. It's their finest hour.

The ultimate payoff for all their hard work and stress and the hundreds of millions they have spent is even a few nanograms of asteroid in the capsule. That's a grain of dust the size of a bacterium. They have evey right and every bligation to themselves, to their organisation, to the Jaanese taxpayer and to the world to do this as slowly and carefully as possible.

And some people seem to think they should just unscrew it and shake it out or bang it with a stick or something. Sheesh!

 

[Gregoire1960]

Jon,

I'll assume you must have had a bad day prior to your last comment as you don't usually flame in here. While it might be a little low brow for your eclectic tastes, it was only meant as humour. You don't have to be an employee of NASA, JAXA, Martin, Lougheed etc to understand and appreciate the hard work that goes into each mission and the care that's involved in retrieving data. I think they did a truly remarkable job thinking outside the box in order to complete the mission, so cut me a little slack on the attitude. Do you really think there are any regulars on this forum that can't appreciate that it takes time to carefully open the capsule??? Me thinks thou read someting into my comment that wasn't there .......

 

[3488]

Contamination is the main issue & worry.

The JAXA scientists have to RECORD every single action involved in opening the capsule. The capsule has to be kept in sterile, clean room conditions AT ALL TIMES.

So much as ONE terrestrial dust particle, bacteria or virus gets in there, it could corrupt any samples from asteroid 25143 Itokawa & the return mission despite it's technical success would be a failure because someone thought the process was far too slow in the lab on Earth & caused contamination through rushing & not checking.

Believe you me, if they find anything in there & it is uncontaminated, they will be the first to announce a successful sample return. :mrgreen:

I agree with Jon Clarke.

Andrew Brown.

 

[orionrider]

Of course, after years of mission and an improbable rescue, it wouldn't do to rush the last few days. Nobody really implied that the JAXA scientists were slow or something. It was just a joke, made me laugh, and I never suspected any disrespect behind it.

 

[JonClarke]

I suspected people did not intend disrepect, but it came across as disrespectful all the same.

Lightbulb jokes are disrespectful by nature, generally at targets that deserve it (how many post-modernists does it take to change a lightbulb?). JAXA does not deserve it.

 

[kg]

I suspected people did not intend disrepect, but it came across as disrespectful all the same.

I'm sorry if it seemed like I was poking fun at JAXA or if my comment was irrelevant to this thread. I am a blacksmith and shoe horses for a living. Much of the work I do involves smacking things with a two pound hammer to get the job done. I was simply amused by the contrast between my own clumsy heavy handed way of doing things and the work the JAXA scientists need to do to open a container. I am a big fan of the Hyabusa mission.

 

[EarthlingX]

I suspected people did not intend disrepect, but it came across as disrespectful all the same.

I'm sorry if it seemed like I was poking fun at JAXA or if my comment was irrelevant to this thread. I am a blacksmith and shoe horses for a living. Much of the work I do involves smacking things with a two pound hammer to get the job done. I was simply amused by the contrast between my own clumsy heavy handed way of doing things and the work the JAXA scientists need to do to open a container. I am a big fan of the Hyabusa mission.

I would agree that some good old smacking with a two pound hammer can come handy, actually it is one of my persuasion techniques that i'm trying to get rid off, though it is handy .. :roll: (hint : computers don't appreciate it, neither do people)

This is a lot trickier, no 'Hulk smash!' approach here, but i can sympathize with your sentiment, even if i don't exactly approve how you expressed it

We will have to wait a bit, but for space fans, that is rather common ..

 

[JonClarke]

I suspected people did not intend disrepect, but it came across as disrespectful all the same.

I'm sorry if it seemed like I was poking fun at JAXA or if my comment was irrelevant to this thread. I am a blacksmith and shoe horses for a living. Much of the work I do involves smacking things with a two pound hammer to get the job done. I was simply amused by the contrast between my own clumsy heavy handed way of doing things and the work the JAXA scientists need to do to open a container. I am a big fan of the Hyabusa mission.

Hey! I am geologist - I hit things with hammers all the time (probably not as large as yours thought).

I am a big fan of blacksmiths. There was a blacksmith's in the next street to mine where I grew up, I could watch them for hours. The roar of the bellows, the glow of the hot iron, the music of the hammer, and the wonder at seeing something new being made captivated me. I still watch blacksmiths every chance I get.

Good to have you here - apologies if I came across as narky.

Jon

 

[kg]

So why is this tiny sample so valuable when tons of rocks from space have already been collected as meteorites? Is it because of contamination, or are meteorites somehow altered by entry into the atmosphere, or because the source is precisely known?

 

[MeteorWayne]

Exactly! We've never had pristine samples from an asteroid, so we dont really know about their state before passing through the atmosphere.

 

[scottb50]

Exactly! We've never had pristine samples from an asteroid, so we dont really know about their state before passing through the atmosphere.

Or it might be we don't know what's inside and want to see. I'm surprised it's not bet on, or naive.

 

[3488]

Exactly! We've never had pristine samples from an asteroid, so we dont really know about their state before passing through the atmosphere.

Yes indeed Wayne, these samples are 100% pure. Also we know with 100% certainty where said samples are from, namely Amor Asteroid 25143 Itokawa & the asteroid has also been extensively imaged from just about every angle multispectrally, so these samples are from a now well known source.

Andrew Brown.

 

[vogon13]

How about that.

It appears there are some small grains in the capsule!

(word is just starting to leak out)


The Hayabusa craft may have dislodged some stuff that was retained in the capsule when it smacked the asteroid. There is confirmation the pyro device did not fire, but it may have been redundant to the inadvertent impact. Or possibly the thrusters puffed some grains into the canister.

 

[EarthlingX]

www.spacedaily.com : Japanese lab finds 'minute particles' in asteroid pod

by Staff Writers
Tokyo (AFP) July 5, 2010

The "Hayabusa" Landing On The Asteroid "Itokawa" Artist's Concept By Akihiro Ikeshita

Japan's space agency said Monday it has found "minute particles" of what it hopes is asteroid dust in the capsule of the space probe Hayabusa which returned to Earth last month.

Scientists hope any dust samples from the potato-shaped asteroid Itokawa could help reveal secrets about the origins of the solar system.

"We have started the opening process of the sample container of Hayabusa since June 24, 2010 and confirmed there are minute particles," the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) said.

But the agency added it remained unclear whether the particles are contaminants from Earth or come from Itokawa which the space probe landed on during its multi-billion-kilometre (mile) journey.

It is expected to take months to get the final results of the analysis.

 

[newtons_laws]

BBC News item with photos of inside of canister and asteroid (hopefully! ) dust particle here:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/science_and_ ... 519895.stm

 

[orionrider]

http://news.bbcimg.co.uk/media/images/4 ... 05_001.jpg

I don't see how that much material could come from the Earth since the canister was perfectly airtight on arrival.
Congratulations, JAXA!

 

[MeteorWayne]

It's easy if you think about it. Remember, the sample was collected in a vacuum. It's not a vacuum here on earth. So when you open the chamber, if the pressure is higher outside, whatever's there will be sucked in. I'm sure they opened it under the best possible vacuum they could create, but is that a lower pressure that the surface of an asteroid?
Hopefully so