NASA spacecraft captures first images of the asteroid it will soon land on

A NASA probe speeding through the solar system has captured its first image of the asteroid Bennu, which the space agency will try to land on in 2020.

Once that happens, the spacecraft OSIRIS-REx is designed to collect up to 4.4 pounds of ancient space rock, seal the minerals in a capsule, and blast the capsule back to Earth. If all goes as planned, the canister will drop down into the Utah desert in 2023. 

SEE ALSO: A 12-mile, underground lake may have been found on Mars. What could live there?

The space probe captured its first image of Bennu from 1.4 million miles away, which is pretty close as far as space distances go (this is about six times the distance between the Earth and moon). But as shown below, the asteroid is still too distant to make out any features or details. It looks like a fuzzy, spinning white dot. Read more...

More about Space, Nasa, Science, Asteroids, and Space Exploration

from Mashable https://ift.tt/2Ncwpkf