NASA's asteroid-bound Lucy spacecraft completes first trajectory correction maneuver

On June 7, NASA's asteroid hunter, Lucy, completed the first in a series of trajectory correction maneuvers the spacecraft will take in preparation for the mission's first Earth gravity assist scheduled for October 16, 2022.

During the course of its mission, Lucy will observe one main belt asteroid and seven Trojan asteroids that share an orbit around the Sun with Jupiter, making it NASA's first single spacecraft mission in history to explore so many different asteroids.

Following its launch in October 2021, one of the spacecraft's two solar arrays failed to latch after deployment. The mission team is in the midst of a multi-stage effort to further deploy its unlatched solar array.

Last month, the spacecraft was commanded thrice to deploy the solar array. The team repeated the deployment command sequence a fourth time on June 2.

While the array still did not latch, the data indicates that it continued to further deploy and stiffen throughout the attempt. The team has several more opportunities to repeat these deployment commands. Even if the array does not ultimately latch, the additional stiffening may be enough to fly the Lucy mission as planned, NASA said on Wednesday.

#LucyMission Update: A multi-stage effort is underway to further deploy the spacecraft’s unlatched solar array. The process is putting the solar array under more tension, further stabilizing it - and that may be enough to fly the mission as planned. https://t.co/CD6cRPOs4s pic.twitter.com/vDezVvhyi9

— NASA Solar System (@NASASolarSystem) June 8, 2022