The BepiColombo spacecraft has made its fifth gravitational maneuver in the vicinity of Mercury. It was the penultimate one for the Earth’s messenger.
The rendezvous with the planet took place on December 1. The distance of the minimum approach was 37,630 km, which is comparable to the orbital altitude of geostationary satellites. This is much larger than during the planet’s first four flybys, when BepiColombo flew between 165 and 240 kilometers from its surface.
A special feature of this flyby was that BepiColombo activated the MERTIS instrument for the first time. It measures the flux of infrared radiation from Mercury’s surface, which makes it possible to find out what minerals it is made of. BepiColombo also took measurements of the solar wind and magnetic fields, and its body-mounted selfie cameras took black-and-white images with a resolution of 1024×1024 pixels.
This maneuver was the penultimate one performed by BepiColombo during its mission. On January 8, 2025, the spacecraft will again use Mercury’s gravity to reduce its speed. BepiColombo will then face a nearly two-year journey through the inner solar system before coming close to Mercury again. This time the vehicle will move to a permanent orbit around the planet, after which it will start the scientific program.
It’s worth noting that this meeting will occur 11 months late relative to the original flight plan. The delay was caused because the engines of the BepiColombo flight module lost some thrust. Because of this, engineers had to change the flight plan and move the vehicle to a new trajectory that ensures arrival at Mercury in November 2026.
Earlier we reported on how BepiColombo managed to photograph Mercury’s south pole for the first time.
