Spacecraft sends new close-ups of Mercury

The BepiColombo spacecraft has passed Mercury for the second time and has sent back new images. However, it has not yet reached its destination.

More than three years after its launch, the BepiColombo space probe has passed its final destination Mercury for the second time. Everything went well, said Simon Blume, ESA mission operations chief at the Darmstadt Control Center. The probe also captured footage as it flew around the innermost planet in our solar system.

The plan was to allow the probe to fly over Mercury at an altitude of about 200 kilometers. Before the 2025 spacecraft, which is controlled from the Darmstadt control center, finally reaches its orbit, it has to fly across the planet a total of six times, and thus its speed is slowed down. The reason is the massive gravitational pull of the sun.

The European Space Agency said on Twitter that flights that exceeded the planets that were calculated years ago require accurate navigation in space. “The distance, angle, and speed must be just right for the satellite to change its orbit at will when it crosses the planet,” he continues.