20161776 Club
An Atlas V lifts off for Bennu, carrying America's first asteroid sample return mission
Dante Lauretta calls the launch exactly perfect, with no anomalies before or during flight.
NASA had tracked asteroids through telescopes for decades but never touched one and brought a piece back. At 23:05 UTC on September 8, 2016, an Atlas V 411 rocket carrying OSIRIS-REx lifted off from Cape Canaveral's Space Launch Complex 41, bound for the near-Earth asteroid Bennu. Fifty-five minutes after ignition, the spacecraft separated cleanly from its launch vehicle. Principal Investigator Dante Lauretta called it exactly perfect: no anomalies before or during launch…
