2000 Oct 26
NEAR Shoemaker Completes Low Pass Over Eros
NEAR Shoemaker is now on the outbound leg of its low-altitude flyover, having dipped to about three miles (5.3 kilometers) over Eros' surface at just before 3 a.m. (EDT).An engine burn, monitored last night from the NEAR Mission Operations Center at the Applied Physics Laboratory, put the spacecraft in a highly elliptical 31-by-13 mile (50-by-21 kilometer) orbit which included this morning's close approach. The first image is already available on the NEAR Web site; other images will follow today.
Another maneuver set for 1:40 p.m. (EDT) today will send NEAR Shoemaker toward a higher, more stable orbit, about 125 miles (200 kilometers) above the asteroid.
"The whole sequence has gone smoothly so far," says NEAR mission operations team member Bob Nelson.
Read more about NEAR Shoemaker's low-altitude flyover from the Oct. 23 Press Release.
