Almost 1 week since launch and almost 2 million miles from Earth! The launch perfectly placed Lucy where it needed to be, no trajectory correction needed!
Check out this nice overview of the #LucyMission by @colkin and Simone Marchi rdcu.be/czYVt
#CountdowntoLaunch! 11 days until the start of the #LucyMission's epic voyage! In order for Lucy to explore 6 asteroid systems over 12 years, we will need to drive the spacecraft. Lucy's 5 Deep Space Maneuvers and 3 Earth Gravity Assists will keep the spacecraft on target!
🏠 Home, home on Lagrange! We successfully completed our burn to start #NASAWebb on its orbit of the 2nd Lagrange point (L2), about a million miles (1.5 million km) from Earth. It will orbit the Sun, in line with Earth, as it orbits L2. blogs.nasa.gov/webb/2022/01/2…#UnfoldTheUniverse
The Lucy Spacecraft is getting ready for its first #EarthGravityAssist! The solid curves show where Lucy (and the Earth) have traveled in the past year, while the dashed curves show what comes next. Lucy is currently only 9 million miles (38x the distance to the Moon) from Earth!
This photo might not look like much, but it is one of the first images returned by the #LucyMission from space! The star field is courtesy of Lucy's Terminal Tracking Camera (T2Cam). All of Lucy's science instruments passed their preliminary tests with flying colors!
At closest approach during #EarthGravityAssist, Lucy will be deep into low Earth orbit, below the current altitude of the International Space Station! Stay tuned for info about how you can #SpotTheSpacecraft from Earth if you live in Australia or western North America.
The left solar panel appears to have not fully deployed, but as the spacecraft is safe, stable, and power-positive there is no rush as team members work to understand the situation.
The the current status can be found at :