NASA's Psyche Mission Set for October Launch After Troubled Year
An independent review board has praised NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory and Caltech for their "world-class" efforts in addressing issues that caused a delay in the Psyche mission's launch, originally scheduled for 2022. The mission will explore a unique metallic asteroid orbiting the sun between Mars and Jupiter, offering a unique window into the violent history of collisions and accretion that created the terrestrial planets like Earth. The spacecraft will reach asteroid Psyche in August 2029, orbiting it for 26 months to gain insights into planetary formation and better understand the interior of terrestrial planets.