European spacecraft to blast off on mission to Mercury
A EUROPEAN Space Agency (ESA) craft is set to blast off from the Earth bound for Mercury, the mysterious planet closest to the sun.
BepiColombo, one of the most ambitious missions ever undertaken by Esa, will send two orbiters to explore the hellish world where surface temperatures reach 450C.
The mission, launching on Saturday, has cost an estimated €1.6bn.
Unlike any other interplanetary spacecraft in history, BepiColombo carries a futuristic ion electric propulsion drive, designed and built in the UK.
Four ion engines on the Mercury Transfer Module (MTM) transporting the orbiters will provide thrust by electrically ejecting a “plasma” of charged xenon gas.
Although the force an ion motor produces is very small – far less than that of a chemical rocket – it can be kept firing for a long period of time.
The four-tonne spacecraft will be launched into an “escape trajectory” orbit by ESA’s most powerful rocket, the Ariane 5, from the European spaceport at Kourou, French Guiana.
It will then set off on a seven-year 8.5-billion km journey involving a complex series of gravity-assist fly-bys around the Earth, Venus, and Mercury.
After playing tag with Mercury six times while crossing the planet’s orbital path, the spacecraft will arrive at its destination in 2025.
Maps
ESA’s Mercury Planet Orbiter (MPO) and the Japanese space agency Jaxa’s Mercury Magnetospheric Orbiter (MMO) will then separate to study the little-known Sun-baked world for up to two years.
MPO will make global maps of Mercury’s surface chemistry and geological features, while MMO investigates the planet’s internal structure and magnetic field.
Only two spacecraft have previously visited Mercury. Nasa’s Mariner 10 flew past the planet three times in 1974-75, and the American space agency’s Messenger probe orbited Mercury from 2011 to 2015, taking photos of the surface.