Flyby of Asteroid Torifune | Japan's Hayabusa2 Spacecraft

Flyby of Asteroid Torifune | Japan's Hayabusa2 Spacecraft

The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) has successfully conducted a flyby of asteroid Torifune, the first asteroid exploration of the Hayabusa2 Extended Mission. On July 5, 2026, at 18:35 Japan Standard Time (JST), the Hayabusa2 spacecraft was confirmed from ground communications to be operating normally.

98943 Torifune (provisional designation 2001 CC21) is an Apollo-type near-Earth asteroid with a diameter of about 450 meters (1,500 feet). It was discovered by the Lincoln Near-Earth Asteroid Research (LINEAR) survey at Socorro, New Mexico, United States on February 3, 2001.

The asteroid explorer Hayabusa2 was launched in December 2014 onboard the H-IIA Launch Vehicle No. 26. The mission explored asteroid Ryugu, delivering samples from Ryugu to Earth on December 6, 2020. Since then, the spacecraft returned to deep space on an Extended Mission. On July 5, 2026 at around 18:30 JST, Hayabusa2 successfully performed a flyby of Torifune, the asteroid selected as the first exploration target of the Extended Mission.

Observations with the onboard scientific instruments began in mid-June with the Optical Navigation Camera—Telescopic (ONC-T) that directly imaged Torifune on June 20. Observations with the ONC-T then continued with the primary purpose to support optical-radio hybrid navigation for the spacecraft during the approach to Torifune. From about one hour before the closest approach, observations were also conducted using the Near-Infrared Spectrometer (NIRS3), Thermal InfraRed Imager (TIR), and Light Detection and Ranging (LIDAR) instruments. These observations continued until immediately before the closest approach to Torifune but could not be conducted after the spacecraft had passed the asteroid. At present, only part of the data acquired by the scientific instruments has been transmitted to Earth. The remaining data will be transmitted to the ground during future operations.

Image Credit: JAXA, Institute of Space and Astronautical Science (ISAS)
Release Date: July 5, 2026

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