After 8 years, Europe's BepiColombo mission is on final approach to Mercury
摘要
欧洲航天局主导、日本和美国参与的贝皮科伦布号水星探测器，在历经八年飞行后，于本周完成关键节点，进入抵达水星的最后阶段。该任务耗资近20亿美元，自2018年发射以来，通过等离子推进及地球、金星和水星的多次飞掠，逐步调整轨道并减速。下一次抵达水星时，其速度将恰好能被行星引力捕获进入环水星轨道。科学家表示，进入水星轨道所需的能量远超飞掠冥王星，任务团队对此已习以为
The BepiColombo mission cleared a major milestone this week in the final stretch of an eight-year interplanetary voyage to Mercury, the hard-to-reach, scorching hot iron world at the Solar System's innermost frontier.
The robotic science mission, with a price tag of nearly $2 billion, is led by the European Space Agency with contributions from Japan and the United States. 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.
Next time it reaches Mercury, BepiColombo will be traveling at just the right speed for the planet's gravity to capture the spacecraft 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. It turns out traveling to fleet-footed Mercury and then entering orbit requires more energy, or delta-v, than sending a probe to fly by Pluto.
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