BULLETIN
Lucy struggles to spread its solar panels
The asteroid-investigating spacecraft is still generating power as it heads towards Jupiter
Lucy, the NASA spacecraft that is bound for the two groups of Trojan asteroids on the same solar orbit as Jupiter, has yet to fully open its solar arrays. The spacecraft launched on 16 October at 09:34 UT and reached Earth orbit so precisely that no subsequent manoeuvres were needed. But when the solar panels deployed, 30 minutes later, only one of them unfurled completely and latched into place, while the other remained partially folded.
Even with one ‘lame wing’, Lucy is generating almost as much power as would be expected if both had deployed successfully. As such, the spacecraft is able to run all the on-board systems needed to begin its journey to the gas giant. As
