Skip to main content

How to watch Japan’s Hayabusa2 spacecraft deliver a slice of asteroid today

Mission Control Live:Hayabusa2 Capsule Reentry Operation

Japan’s Hayabusa2 spacecraft will soon be returning a sample of asteroid to Earth. The sample is safely stowed away in a capsule that will re-enter Earth’s atmosphere and land in the Australian desert, and we’ve got the details on how you can watch this event live.

Recommended Videos

What’s happening with the capsule landing

In order to ensure the asteroid sample is safely returned to Earth, it is encased in a capsule which recently separated from the Hayabusa2 spacecraft. The sample comes from the asteroid Ryugu, located around 200 million miles away where the spacecraft stayed for 17 months.

Please enable Javascript to view this content

Hayabusa2 landed on the asteroid in February 2019, which was an impressive feat as the asteroid is only 900 meters (2,952 feet) wide. It collected a sample from the surface by firing a “bullet” at the asteroid in order to throw up dust and particles which could be collected. Five months later, in July 2019, the spacecraft successfully collected a subsurface sample from the asteroid as well. The spacecraft began its journey back to Earth approximately one year ago, bringing its precious cargo with it.

Now it has arrived back at Earth, and the challenge is to get the sample from the spacecraft to the ground. The spacecraft itself won’t be landing — it’ll be heading off to explore another asteroid on a journey that should take another 10 years. But as it flies past Earth, it has released a capsule containing the sample of asteroid Ryugu, and it’s this capsule that will be landing today.

How to watch the capsule landing

Coverage of the capsule re-entry into the atmosphere will begin today, Saturday, December 5, at 9:00 a.m. PT. Re-entry itself is scheduled for 9:28 a.m. PT, when it will enter the “fireball phase” as it blasts through the atmosphere. The parachute will be deployed a few minutes later, and the landing of the capsule is scheduled for 9:47 a.m. ET in a sparsely populated area of Woomera, Australia.

Officials will collect the sample from Woomera and take it to a Quick Look Facility. It will then be shared with researchers around the globe. They hope that studying the sample can aid in understanding the formation of the solar system and can show how radiation affects materials from the asteroid’s surface.

The coverage will be shown on JAXA’s YouTube channel, which you can watch here, or using the embedded video at the top of this page.

Georgina Torbet
Georgina has been the space writer at Digital Trends space writer for six years, covering human space exploration, planetary…
How to watch the Quadrantid meteor shower hit its peak tonight
An image from the Quadrantid meteor shower.

Tonight will see the peak of the Quadrantid meteor shower, one of the lesser-known meteor showers of the year. It won't be as big or bright as some of the more famous showers like the Geminids or the Leonids, but it's still a great excuse to head out and do some stargazing to celebrate the new year.

If you'd like to check out this event, we have advice on how to watch the shower in person -- or a livestream option for those who fancy seeing the sights without venturing out into the cold.
What is the Quadrantid meteor shower?
An image from the Quadrantid meteor shower. NASA

Read more
How to watch the Geminid Meteor Shower this week
Over 100 meteors are recorded in this composite image taken during the peak of the Geminid meteor shower in 2014.

This week will see the peak of one of the year's best meteors showers, the Geminids. This yearly event happens when Earth passes through a cloud of debris left behind by an asteroid called 3200 Phaethon. As this asteroid makes its orbit around the sun every 1.4 years, it leaves behind a trail of dust and rock particles that intersects with Earth's orbit. When our planet passes through this debris trail, the particles of rock burn up in Earth's atmosphere and result in a shower of meteors or, as they are colloquially known, shooting stars.

Meteor showers are fun astronomical events to observe even for newbies as they don't require any special equipment and can be seen with the naked eye. We've got details below on how to watch the meteor shower in person. If you don't fancy braving the cold, there's also a livestream where you can observe the sight from the cozy confines of home.

Read more
How to watch the SpaceX Falcon Heavy launch U.S. space plane to orbit
SpaceX's Falcon Heavy heading to space.

UPDATE: SpaceX has stood down from four previous launch targets and is now aiming to launch the USSF-52 mission on Thursday, December 28. The article below has been updated to include this new information.

SpaceX is planning to launch its powerful Falcon Heavy rocket from the Kennedy Space Center on Thursday, December 28.

Read more