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This Week in Good News: Asteroids, Space and the Pope
Stellar work can be exhilarating to behold
A scene from the 1987 Steve Martin film “Roxanne” is a perfect model of life right now.
Martin’s character inserts a quarter into a newspaper box, scans the headlines, then screams in horror. He produces another quarter, shoves the paper back into the box, and walks away.
Current events can be overwhelming. It is easy to forget we live in an age of wonder. This week, three stories remind us how excellent this time we all share can be.
NASA sent a spaceship to an asteroid
On Tuesday, the Osiris-Rex landed on an asteroid called Bennu for about six seconds. Osiris-Rex stands for Origins, Spectral Interpretation, Resource Identification, Security, Regolith Explorer. Regolith is a rocky outcropping.
Osiris is the first United States space ship sent for sampling an asteroid. The mission was picture perfect, according to NASA. There is ample time before the March departure window if another pass is needed.
This mission matters because:
- Osiris flew 207 million miles, or twice the distance to the sun.
- It moved at more than 5 km per hour. That’s more than 12,000 mph.
