Bennu Samples Don't Land Normally Due To Drogue Problems

Sampe Bennu landed with a drogue parachute (photo: dock. NASA)

JAKARTA - The United States Aeronautics and Space Agency (NASA) revealed that there was a problem with Drogue, a small parachute, when it brought the OSIRIS-REx sample capsule back to earth.

This problem was only reviewed by NASA on Tuesday, December 5. Although asteroid Bennu managed to land perfectly, NASA still acknowledged that the OSIRIS-REx capsule did not land according to their plan.

"Although delivery was successful, the landing sequence did not go as planned, with a small parachute called the drogue not growing as expected," NASA said on the official website.

The institute reviewed the video as OSIRIS-REx landed in the Utah Desert. In the video researched, NASA realized that the Drogue cable label didn't match their design so the Drogue rolled out an irregular parachute while the engineer was sending the signal.

Supposedly, Drogue spreads at an altitude of 100,000 feet so that the movement of the capsule stabilizes when it reaches an altitude of 10,000 feet. On the other hand, the signal from the engineer justru makes the Drogue only spread at an altitude of 9,000 feet.

Despite this problem, the Drogue main parachute is still working normally so the capsule can land slowly. This capsule reportedly landed one minute ahead of NASA's expectations.

Landing beyond this estimate does not damage the sample. NASA said that, There is no negative impact on the Bennu OSIRIS-REx sample due to the unexpected spread of Drogue.

The problem of Drogue not working perfectly is still being studied by NASA. The institute has kept Drogue at the Johnson Space Center. They will find out more about the problem of inappropriate data acceptance.