Messenger mission: Nasa's Mercury probe ends 11 years of life with a bump by crashing into planet at 8,750mph

The planned impact occurred at 3.26pm EDT on Thursday, controllers at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics laboratory confirmed.

Before its demise, the Messenger probe, short for Mercury Surface, Space Environment, Geochemistry and Ranging tweeted a farewell to its followers.

“Well, I guess it’s time to say goodbye to all my friends, family, support team. I will be making my final impact very soon.”

#thatsmessenger pic.twitter.com/NPK4zqtNPM

— MESSENGER (@MESSENGER2011) April 30, 2015

Messenger is the first craft to orbit Mercury and, after four years and 4,105 orbits, delivered a “stunningly long list of discoveries”, which changed views of the the “entire inner solar system”, according to principal investigator Sean Solomon.

Among numerous discoveries, the Messenger probe determined Mercury’s surface composition, geological history, internal magnetic field and the existence of frozen water on the solar system’s smallest planet.

John Grunsfeld, associate administrator for Nasa’s science mission directorate in Washington, said: “Going out with a bang as it impacts the surface of Mercury, we are celebrating Messenger as more than a successful mission.

This image, taken March 29, 2011, is the first ever obtained from a spacecraft in orbit around Mercury. “The Messenger mission will continue to provide scientists with a bonanza of new results as we begin the next phase of this mission–analysing the exciting data already in the archives, and unravelling the mysteries of Mercury.”

The mood at the Mission Operations Centre was described as both sombre and celebratory as the team members watched the final moments of Messenger’s mission being relayed to the facility in California.

Nasa's most stunning pictures of space

 

“We monitored Messenger’s beacon signal for about 20 additional minutes,” mission operations manager Andy Calloway said.

“It was strange to think during that time Messenger had already impacted, but we could not confirm it immediately due to the vast distance across space between Mercury and Earth.”

When Nasa’s Deep Space Network station in California stopped received signals from the probe, just minutes after the initial collision, at 3.40pm EDT, mission controllers were able to confirm the end of Messenger’s operations.

An image of Mercury taken from Nasa’s Messenger space probe The conclusion of Messenger’s mission, on the scorched surface of the planet closest to the Sun, was not recorded as the probe hit the side of Mercury which faces away from Earth.

Space-based telescopes were also unable to capture the impact as the proximity of the Sun to Mercury would damage the telescopes’ optics.

Messenger was launched on 3 August 2004, but did not begin its first orbit of Mercury until 17 March 2011.

The probe completed its primary objective in March 2012, but its life was extended twice and it was able to send back detailed images of the planet’s surface and record unparalleled information.

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