Japan releases snowman-like asteroid image after fly-by

TOKYO - Rare images taken by a Japanese space probe during a fly-by of a near-Earth asteroid have revealed that the space rock resembled a snowman, scientists said on July 6.

The fridge-sized Hayabusa2 skimmed asteroid Torifune on July 5 in a mission that demonstrated the ability to deflect a potentially dangerous space rock away from Earth.

A new image released by the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) on July 6 could aid such efforts, as researchers say near-Earth asteroids vary in their size, shape and surface characteristics.

“The moment I actually saw this image and the scientific data – it really gave me goosebumps,” JAXA scientist Yuya Mimasu told reporters, adding the asteroid “personally looked like a snowman”.

The black-and-white image, captured by a telescopic camera, showed what appeared to be two round objects joined together.

“You can actually see the rocks... I really hadn’t expected to be able to take a photo like this, so I’m absolutely over the moon,” he said.

The mission follows NASA’s successful 2022 test that changed the orbit of the asteroid Dimorphos by deliberately smashing it with a spacecraft.

Torifune was known to have an elongated shape, but its details were unknown.

Moving at a speed of more than 18,000km per hour, the probe was due to fly within 800m of the asteroid, but JAXA said they would analyse the distance later.

If confirmed, the mission would be one of the closest fly-bys of a near-Earth asteroid ever.

JAXA also said on July 6 that it succeeded in acquiring data from three other devices which can measure the distance from the asteroid and examine the existence of water.

JAXA and the European Space Agency have teamed up on another so-called “planetary defence” mission to explore the asteroid Apophis, which will pass close to Earth in April 2029.

Launched in 2014, Hayabusa2 has already thrilled scientists by landing on and gathering material from the asteroid Ryugu, some 300,000,000km from our planet.

Six years later, it returned to Earth precious samples from Ryugu – “dragon palace” in Japanese – providing scientists with clues about what the solar system was like at its birth some 4.6 billion years ago.

After the Torifune mission, the space probe is expected to attempt in 2031 a “rendezvous” – a manoeuvre where it flies alongside or touches down on a space rock to gather detailed data – with an asteroid called 1998KY26. AFP