The BepiColombo spacecraft, which will become the third probe
to visit Mercury, has been unveiled ahead of a mission that will tackle some of
the deepest mysteries of our solar system.
The spacecraft, scheduled to launch in October 2018, will
investigate the existence of water ice at Mercury’s poles and its volcanoes,
and attempt to explain the surprising discovery that the solar system’s
smallest planet appears to be shrinking. Mercury remains the most elusive of
the solar system’s inner planets.
BepiColombo is a joint venture between ESA and the Japanese
space agency, Jaxa, and comprises a pair of spacecrafts (one per agency) that
will be bolted together in a 6.4-metre-high stack before its launch from Kourou
in French Guiana.
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