A Japanese spacecraft is just hours away from a historic attempt to land two tiny, hopping robots on the big asteroid Ryugu, and you can see near real-time photos of the spaceflight action. The Hayabusa2 probe, which has been orbiting Ryugu since late June, is scheduled to deploy a pair of 2.4-lb. (1.1 kilograms) "rovers" between midnight and 12:30 a.m. EDT Friday (Sept. 21; 0400 to 0430 GMT). The Hayabusa2 mother ship has already begun descending toward Ryugu in advance of the deployment, and the spacecraft is snapping photos of the asteroid for navigation purposes. And lucky us: The mission team and the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) are posting these photos in near real time here: http://www.hayabusa2.jaxa.jp/en/galleries/onc/nav20180920/ At the moment, images are coming down to Earth every 29 minutes, according to the time stamps. Ryugu gets larger and larger in each successive photo as Hayabusa2 gets closer and closer to the 3,000-foot-wide (900 meters) space rock. The asteroid Ryugu, as seen by Japan's Hayabusa2 spacecraft on June 26, 2018, just one day before its arrival at the space rock. (Image credit: JAXA, University of Tokyo, Kochi University, Rikkyo University, Nagoya University, Chiba Institute of Technology, Meiji University, University of Aizu, AIST) The two little disk-shaped robots that will soon separate from the orbiter are called MINERVA-II1A and MINERVA-II1B. Each one measures 7 inches wide by 2.8 inches tall (18 by 7 centimeters) and is packed with scientific gear, including temperature and optical sensors and a suite of cameras. (There are seven cameras spread across both robots, JAXA officials have said.) Though the Hayabusa2 team calls them rovers, these little guys will hop, rather than roll, from place to place on Ryugu's surface, gathering a variety of data along the way. And more landings are coming soon. Hayabusa2 is scheduled to deploy a bigger lander called MASCOT in the first week of October and another small hopper, MINERVA-II2, sometime next year. The mother ship itself will also make several forays to the surface in 2019, to grab asteroid material that will be returned to Earth in December 2020. "MINERVA" stands for "Micro Nano Experimental Robot Vehicle for Asteroid." And about that "II" business: A MINERVA hopper flew aboard the original Hayabusa mission, which arrived at the asteroid Itokawa in 2005. The original MINERVA did not succeed in its landing attempt. Follow Mike Wall on Twitter @michaeldwall and Google+. Follow us @Spacedotcom, Facebook or Google+. Originally published on Space.com.<doc-sep>We are sorry we have kept you waiting! MINERVA-II1 consists of two rovers, 1a & 1b. Both rovers are confirmed to have landed on the surface of Ryugu. They are in good condition and have transmitted photos & data. We also confirmed they are moving on the surface. #asteroidlanding<doc-sep>NASA release visualisation of all known asteroids Solar System FREE for the biggest new releases, reviews and tech hacks SUBSCRIBE Invalid email Sign up forfor the biggest new releases, reviews and tech hacks When you subscribe we will use the information you provide to send you these newsletters. Sometimes they'll include recommendations for other related newsletters or services we offer. Our Privacy Notice explains more about how we use your data, and your rights. You can unsubscribe at any time. The monstrous space rock, dubbed Asteroid 2018 RH6, will make an “Earth Close Approach” late this evening. NASA expects Asteroid RH6 to barrel past the planet at 9.56pm UK time (8.56pm UT), within an uncertainty of less than one minute. Asteroid RH6 is a large, Aten-type Near-Earth Object (NEO) which has been flying past Earth since at least May 1922. Aten asteroids are space rocks in orbits similar to Asteroid 2062 Aten – a celestial body which orbits the Sun every 347 days. NEOs are all asteroids and comets which fly by our home planet from a distance smaller than 1.3 astronomical units (au) or more than 92.95 million miles (149.59 million km). Tonight, Asteroid RH6 will approach Earth from a nominal distance of 0.02201au or more than 2.04 million miles (3.29 million km). The distance is roughly equivalent to 8.57 times the distance between the Earth and the Moon, a unit known as Lunar Distance (LD). Two million miles might seem to be a lifetime away but it is an incredibly close approach on the astronomical scale of distances. Read more: NASA meteor WARNING: Fireball 40 TIMES brighter than Moon streaks over Alabama NASA asteroid warning: Asteroid RH6 will fly past the Earth tonight Because Asteroid RH6 will pass so close, the rock is being monitored by NASA’s Center for Near Earth Object Studies at the JPL in the California Institute of Technology. The asteroid measures somewhere within an estimated range of 27.8ft to 62.3ft in diameter (8.5m to 19m). NASA’s upper estimate would place the asteroid on par with a 44-tonne lorry and trailer combination, as per the 2009 UK road rules. But even at 27.8 ft the asteroid would only be 8.3 ft shorter than a London double-decker bus. Read more: Meteor showers 2018: FULL LIST of meteor showers to watch after Perseids before year ends According to Dr Detlef Koschny, a lecturer with the Chair of Astronautics at the Technical University of Munich, asteroids measuring around to 65ft in diameter can be dangerous. We will definitely see something like that again in our lifetime Dr Detlef Koschny, Technical University of Munich The asteroid expert said asteroids of this calibre typically strike the planet every 10 to 100 years. An asteroid of this size last struck Earth over Chelyabinsk in Russia in 2013. More than 1,500 people were injured when the asteroid erupted in bright light over the Russian city. Read more: Asteroid TB145 warning: When will SKULL FACE asteroid skim past the Earth? NASA asteroid warning: The giant space rock could be as big as a 44-tonne lorry and trailer NASA asteroid warning: Asteroid RH6 will return to Earth on December 17, 2018<doc-sep>
The bots will take photos and temperature readings while bouncing around the asteroid. ASTEROID LANDING Move over, Bruce Willis — a pair of robots are the latest to attempt a landing on an asteroid millions of miles from Earth. But unlike Willis, these bots aren’t there to blow it up. No, the bots, each of which weighs 1.1 kilogram (2.4 pounds), is there to study the kilometer-wide space rock. Whether they’ll succeed, though, is a real nail-biter. We won’t know until Saturday, when the bots go online, whether they survived the landing. “We are very much hopeful,” said Yuichi Tsuda, a project manager at Japan’s space agency, according to Phys.org. “We don’t have confirmation yet, but we are very, very hopeful.” BOUNCE BOTS In December 2014, the Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency launched Hayabusa2, a refrigerator-sized spacecraft destined for Ryugu, a lumpy asteroid roughly 289 million kilometers (180 million miles) from Earth. Hayabusa2 reached Ryugu in June; on Friday, it tossed a pair of small exploratory robots toward the asteroid. If they land successfully, the robots will use their solar-powered motors to bounce around the asteroid’s surface, remaining airborne for periods as long as 15 minutes thanks to Ryugu’s weak gravity. From a vantage point up to 15 meters (49 feet) above the surface, the bots will record information such as surface temperature and photos of the asteroid, then beam it back to Earth. HOME AGAIN The mission could help us better understand how our solar system formed, since Ryugu and asteroids like it haven’t changed much over the past 4.5 billion years. It could also provide valuable information for future asteroid mining efforts. After all, Ryugu is worth an estimated $95 billion, so there’s a huge financial incentive to figuring out how best to harvest those potential profits. Hayabusa2 will hang around Ryugu until the end of 2019 to complete several other experiments. By 2021 it will return to Earth with samples in tow — and hopefully new insights into our past and future along with it. READ MORE: Japan Space Robots to Probe Asteroid 170 Million Miles From Earth [Bloomberg] For more on asteroid mining: Want to Snag a Job Mining Asteroids Someday? You Can Now Get Your Masters in It. As a Futurism reader, we invite you join the Singularity Global Community, our parent company’s forum to discuss futuristic science & technology with like-minded people from all over the world. It’s free to join, sign up now!