spacetoday.net: Hayabusa capsule lands in Australia

Posted: Mon, Jun 14, 2010, 8:02 AM ET (1202 GMT)
Hayabusa reenters over Australia (SETI Inst.)

A capsule from a Japanese spacecraft that visited an asteroid landed in the Australian outback on Sunday and has since been recovered. The capsule from the Hayabusa spacecraft reentered over Australia and landed at the Woomera range at around 10 am EDT (1400 GMT) Sunday. The capsule was located shortly after landing and was recovered on Monday, with the Japanese space agency JAXA stating that the capsule was found intact. Scientists hope the capsule contains samples of the asteroid Itokawa, which Hayabusa visited during its seven-year mission. While the spacecraft's sample collection mechanism did not work as planned, scientist hope that it was still able to collect some dust from the asteroid. The main Hayabusa spacecraft reentered along with the capsule and burned up.