JAXA confirms that its Venus probe ‘Akatsuki’ misses orbit

December 9th, 2010 - 8:54 pm ICT by Aishwarya Bhatt  

Tokyo, Dec 9 (THAINDIAN NEWS) In some news that is going to provide a setback to the scientific community, the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) has revealed that its Venus probe mission failed. According to revelations made by JAXA, the ‘Akatsuki’ Venus probe didn’t enter the orbit at all. However the project team is still optimistic that the mission wasn’t a total failure and some gain can still be got from it.

Project manager Masato Nakamura said that there is a chance that the Akatsuki satellite can still get a second chance to enter Venus orbit, if the satellite is able to stay in space for the next 6 years. He feels that if the satellite stays put in space, and then Venus will provide another golden chance to the satellite.

“I would like to say, with hope, that when the time comes we should then have a high probability of success,” according to project manager Masato Nakamura.

However this seems a distant possibility because Akatsuki has a design life of only 4.5 years. But the scientists say that since the satellite is now revolving on its own around the Sun, so its solar panels would be illuminated and this would in turn drastically reduce the battery wear and tear.

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