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The 0.6 kilogram Micro/Nano Experimental Robot Vehicle for Asteroid (MINERVA) was deployed from Hayabusa at 06:24 GMT on Saturday 12 November. The deployment was expected to take place while Hayabusa was descending towards the asteroid, at a height of around 55 metres. However, an unexplained glitch caused the probe to be released while Hayabusa was pulling away from asteroid Itokawa at a height of 200 metres. The asteroid's relatively low gravitational strength is too weak to have pulled the probe toward it from such a distance, and now MINERVA is thought to be drifting in space.
The Japanese Space Agency's (JAXA's) website said: "regrettably, as for leaving MINERVA on Itokawa's surface, it seems that it is not possible."
The baked bean tin-sized MINERVA probe was designed to 'hop' around the asteroid, taking extremely detailed close-up images of the surface material, and measuring surface temperatures.
"The apparent loss of MINERVA is a disappointment," Louis Friedman, executive director of the California-based Planetary Society, said in an e-mail message to MSNBC.com, "but it in no way diminishes the admirable mission that JAXA carried out. They are doing something that no one else has tried in space; and the achievements of rendezvous engineering and close-up science are already truly remarkable."
Hayabusa has now returned safely to its 'home' position, 6.4 kilometres from Itokawa.
The mission's main objective is to collect a sample of asteroid material and return it to Earth for analysis. Hayabusa will descend to the surface for two sample collection attempts on 19 and 25 November. If successful, Hayabusa will be the first asteroid sample return mission. Hayabusa is due to return to Earth in June 2007.
More info: JAXA: Hayabusa
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