BepiColombo

Our mission's Science Working Team had a highly productive meeting in Sapporo, Japan, last week, gearing up for the joint arrival of the @JAXA_MMO Mio and @esascience @ESA_Bepi MPO spacecraft at Mercury later this year! #bepicolombo 🛰️🛰️

It's one year until we reach Mercury to stay! Follow this link to catch up with what we've been up to during our trip to this fascinating little planet! 🙂#bepicolombo

@appler It is cool! 🙂 Those noises are the from the rotation of the solar panels - you can see them turning in the monitoring camera images during the 2nd event. More details here: esa.int/ESA_Multimedia…

@BepiColombo That’s cool. What were the noises/vibrations at 00:17 and 00:50? Thrusters?

🤔In space, no one can hear you... make an orbit-bending flyby of Mercury. So BepiColombo recorded its vibrations and turned them into sounds

More info & credits: esa.int/ESA_Multimedia…

@SymphonyIn152mm Here's a link to an annotated image where you can see which crater is Mendelssohn 😊 esa.int/ESA_Multimedia…

@BepiColombo I knew it existed, but didn't know it was in the video! That's very cool. Thank you guys for making Mercury an interesting planet!

📽️Sit down, relax and enjoy #BepiColombo’s views as it moved gracefully around Mercury on 7-8 January 2025. 🎼🎶Playing in the background is The Hebrides overture by Felix Mendelssohn - can you guess why?

The issue that arose in Spring 2024 was an unexpected reduction in power being provided to the solar electric propulsion thrusters by the solar panels, rather than with the thrusters themselves. The decision was taken in September 2024 to run the thrusters under reduced power, which postpones arrival at Mercury. We expect that both BepiColombo orbiters will successfully enter orbit around Mercury in November 2026. esa.int/Science_Explor…

@BepiColombo Great, wow 🤩 @BepiColombo can we get some updates regarding the ion thruster performance? So you are confident that November 2026 will be met? Thanks for reaching out! Can‘t wait for BepiColombo to finally reach Mercury!

Our top three images from the sixth Mercury flyby are here! 🌗 See what they reveal about the mysterious planet here 👉 esa.int/Science_Explor… and in 🧵👇

@SymphonyIn152mm Correct! 😁 Fun fact: to write this piece, Mendelssohn was inspired by Fingal's Cave (Scotland), created by ancient lava flows. The Mendelssohn crater, visible from 00:28 in the video, was actually flooded by lava a long time ago

@BepiColombo Mendelssohn's Crater? I'd imagine that's why.

ℹ️More info and credits: esa.int/ESA_Multimedia…

@puertoricomint The light areas indicate more recently-formed features. Ice is likely to be found at the bottom of craters at the poles, where sunlight never falls. On the sunlit part, temperatures are too high. They can reach 450 degrees C.

@BepiColombo The black & white images show some areas of the surface a very light color...iced fields? Just reminds me of the way sometimes electricity lighted populated areas on Earth show from photos taken in Space...

@cosmic_rant Yes, correct, we're looking "along" one of the spacecraft's solar panels. The cameras that took these images were installed to check that the solar arrays and booms deployed correctly after launch. Much more powerful science cameras will be used when we're orbiting Mercury.

@BepiColombo Stunning! Is the object on the bottom part of the spacecraft?

@CiteEspace 🙌 Access all images here esa.int/Science_Explor…

L'ESA vient de publier la première image du 6ᵉ survol de Mercure par la sonde @BepiColombo hier.

Lava and debris brighten Mercury's surface The bright patch near the planet's upper edge in this image taken by M-CAM 2 is the Nathair Facula, the aftermath of the largest volcanic explosion on Mercury. This is a major target for several #BepiColombo instruments. Measuring the composition of the erupted material will tell us what Mercury is made of, and how the planet formed. The relatively young Fonteyn crater is also visible. Its youth is apparent from the brightness of the impact debris that radiates out from it. Rustaveli, seen roughly in the centre of Mercury, is a so-called peak ring basin. In the foreground, the Mercury Planetary Orbiter’s medium gain antenna (top centre) and magnetometer boom (right) are visible.

Mercury's sunlit north viewed by M-CAM 1 This image shows that large regions of Mercury's heavily cratered surface are smoothed over by lava from volcanic eruptions. This smoothing is visible inside the 290 km-wide crater at the right of the image, called Mendelssohn. The vast plains surrounding it are called Borealis Planitia. The 1,500 km-diameter Caloris basin appears in the lower left portion of the globe. This is Mercury's largest well-preserved impact structure, and one of the largest in the Solar System. The foreground of the image shows #BepiColombo's solar array (centre right), and a part of the Mercury Transfer Module (lower left).

@amurawaiye @fwd79 @NASASun Good question, but once detached from the MPO and Mio spacecraft, MTM will have served its purpose of delivering the two orbiter spacecraft safely to Mercury. MTM needs to be attached to MPO to operate, so as planned, won't be operating on its own in solar orbit.

@BepiColombo @fwd79 @NASASun What functions would MTM be performing in the sun's orbit?

🛰️🌑We're gearing up for BepiColombo's sixth Mercury flyby, coming up this Wednesday! ℹ️Closest approach is 295 km at 06:59 CET We'll investigate Mercury's cold night side, north pole craters, and the vast northern plains 👇esa.int/Science_Explor…

@superparsec 😁😁😁

@BepiColombo Awww, come on... maybe just a sneak peek today, pretty please? :D

Stay tuned!