In the early evening of January 25 at the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto, a panel of experts provided an introduction, update and context of Canada’s participation in the OSIRIS-REx asteroid mission.
The OSIRIS-REx mission is now in orbit around asteroid Bennu. The spacecraft was launched on September 8th, 2016.
Canada is participating in the mission by providing the OSIRIS-REx Laser Altimeter or OLA, which will create a 3-D map of asteroid Bennu’s shape along with helping with navigation. The mission will continue until March 2021 when the spacecraft will return to Earth arriving 2 1/2 years later in September 2023. At that point the sample return capsule will reenter the Earth’s atmosphere and land in Utah where it will be collected and analyzed by researchers, including in Canada.
The panel discussion was hosted by Dan Riskin and included Tim Haltigin of the Canadian Space Agency, Kate Howells of the Planetary Society and the Government of Canada’s Space Advisory Board, Mike Daly of York University, and Kim Tait of the Royal Ontario Museum.
Watch the discussion below.
https://youtu.be/9Gro715ZVJ8?t=562