BepiColombo Mission on Final Approach to Mercury After 8-Year Voyage
After eight years in space, Europe's BepiColombo mission has cleared a key milestone and is on final approach to Mercury, with orbit insertion planned for later this year.
Since its launch in 2018, BepiColombo has spiraled closer to the Sun using a combination of plasma propulsion and a series of flybys of Earth, Venus, and Mercury. The maneuvers changed the spacecraft's velocity and steered it toward a final encounter with Mercury later this year. At that point, the spacecraft will be traveling at just the right speed for the planet's gravity to capture it into orbit.
Scientists working on interplanetary missions are accustomed to long waits for scientific payoffs. It took nearly 10 years for NASA's New Horizons spacecraft to travel from Earth to Pluto. Traveling to fast-orbiting Mercury and then entering its orbit requires more energy, or delta-v, than sending a probe to fly by Pluto.