The European space mission to Mercury, BepiColombo, flew past Mercury for the first time during the night from Friday to Saturday, the European Space Agency reported. The probe flew less than 200 kilometers above the planet’s surface, taking pictures and taking measurements.

BepiColombo was launched in October 2018. Consisting of two satellites, one European and one Japanese, the probe is set to orbit the innermost planet of our solar system by 2025. There, the devices will investigate, among other things, how the planet is constructed. BepiColombo also aims to find out how a planet can form when it orbits close to a star.

To reach Mercury, BepiColombo makes nine flights relatively close to a planet. It did that once by Earth, twice by Venus and now six flights by Mercury. The last flight past Venus took place in August. These maneuvers allow BepiColombo to reach the correct speed and orbit to safely orbit Mercury.

FIRST PICTURE

The first photo taken during the flyby was sent to Earth thirty minutes after the maneuver. Soon after, everyone could watch it. The photo was taken 1,000 kilometers away rather than when the probe was closest, at 200 kilometers. This is because BepiColombo flew past the dark side of the planet when it was closest to the planet.

Mercury is the innermost and smallest planet in our solar system. Mercury is difficult to study because it is close to the sun and telescopes can get damaged by the sun’s bright light if they look directly at the planet. Only the NASA missions Mariner 10 and Messenger preceded BepiColombo with a flight past Mercury.

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