NASA spacecraft to zoom past asteroid this weekend at 30,000 mph
3 minute readPublished: Friday, April 18, 2025 at 4:58 pm
**NASA's Lucy Spacecraft to Fly By Asteroid Donaldjohanson This Weekend**
Get ready for a cosmic close encounter! NASA's Lucy spacecraft is gearing up for a thrilling flyby of asteroid Donaldjohanson this weekend. This marks the second asteroid encounter for Lucy, a mission designed to explore the ancient remnants of our solar system. Launched in 2021, Lucy is on a mission to visit a total of 11 space rocks, offering scientists a unique opportunity to understand the early formation of planets.
This weekend's flyby of Donaldjohanson, located in the main asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter, serves as a crucial dress rehearsal for Lucy's main event: its arrival at the Trojan asteroids near Jupiter in 2027. Lucy will zoom past Donaldjohanson at a staggering 30,000 mph, coming within 596 miles of the asteroid. Scientists are eager to learn more about Donaldjohanson's size, shape, and composition, as it's believed to be a fragment from a major collision that occurred 150 million years ago.
The encounter will be a high-speed affair, with data taking 12 minutes to reach Earth. The mission team, including the paleontologist for whom the asteroid is named, will be closely monitoring the event. Unlike its first flyby, Lucy will protect its instruments from sunlight by stopping tracking Donaldjohanson 40 seconds before its closest approach.
Lucy's ultimate goal is to study the Trojan asteroids, swarms of space rocks that share Jupiter's orbit. The spacecraft, named after the famous human ancestor fossil, carries a plaque with inspiring words and a diamond disc for scientific instruments. This mission promises to unlock valuable insights into the history of our solar system.
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