MESSENGER News Thread, news, updates and discussion Options

[paxdan]

Launched on August 3rd 2004, NASA's MESSENGER will become the first spacecraft to orbit Mercury.

News and updates are availbale via Johns Hopkins University MESSENGER website and the Kennedy Space Center's MESSENGER website.

There will be an earth flyby in August followed by a couple of swings by Venus and three velocity scrubbing passages past mecury before the craft enters orbit in March 2011.

April 18, 2005 status report from JHU. Extensive JHU FAQs page here.

[Guest_BruceMoomaw_*]

"Because Messenger is usually too close to Earth to see it as more than a speck..."

Gaaah. I'm going senile. Make that "too FAR FROM Earth to see it as more than a speck".

[JRehling]

"Because Messenger is usually too close to Earth to see it as more than a speck..."

Gaaah.  I'm going senile.  Make that "too FAR FROM Earth to see it as more than a speck".

Usually, true, but it's getting closer all the time during these few months. The mission site now has animations depicting the Earth/Venus flybys, and I have some hope that Messenger could produce the "definitive" CCD images of Earth from space. There are darn few good CCD images of the full Earth, but Messenger will have an almost-full Earth for most of its approach, when Earth would fill and more than fill its camera frame. If they got some full-color shots at 6-hour intervals, it would be a wonderful thing, and an unusual photo credit for a Mercury-bound craft.