List of missions to minor planets

List of missions to minor planets

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Spacecraft	Launch date	Targeted minor planet	Mission	Outcome	Remarks	Carrier rocket

Galileo	18 October 1989	951 Gaspra	Flyby	Successful	Incidental flyby en route to Jupiter; flyby occurred on 29 October 1991 with closest approach of 1,604 kilometres (997 mi) at 22:37 UTC	Space Shuttle Atlantis STS-34 / IUS

243 Ida	Flyby	Successful	Incidental flyby en route to Jupiter, discovered Dactyl; flyby occurred on 28 August 1993 with closest approach of 2,410 kilometres (1,500 mi) at 16:51:59 UTC

Clementine (DSPSE)	25 January 1994	1620 Geographos	Flyby	Spacecraft failure	Attitude control failure; failed to leave geocentric orbit after first phase of mission exploring the Moon. Flyby had been planned for August 1994	Titan II(23)G

NEAR Shoemaker (Discovery 2)	17 February 1996	253 Mathilde	Flyby	Successful	Closest approach 1,212 kilometres (753 mi) at 12:56 UTC on 27 June 1997	Delta II 7925

433 Eros	Orbiter	Mostly successful	Aborted burn three days before arrival at Eros resulted in failure to enter orbit, instead flew past at 3,827 kilometres (2,378 mi) at 18:41:23 on 23 December 1998.

Cassini–Huygens	15 October 1997	2685 Masursky	Flyby	N/A	Distant incidental flyby en route to Saturn; closest approach 1.5 million kilometres (0.9 million miles) at 09:58 UTC on 23 January 2000	Titan IV(401)B Centaur-T

Deep Space 1	24 October 1998	4015 Wilson–Harrington	Flyby	Spacecraft failure	Spacecraft was unable to reach the asteroid due to ion engine operation being suspended while a problem with the probe's star tracker was investigated	Delta II 7326

9969 Braille	Flyby	Partial failure	Closest approach 28.3 kilometres (17.6 mi) at 04:46 UTC on 29 July 1999. Intended to pass within 14 kilometres (8.7 mi) but this was not achieved due to a computer failure; poor-quality images returned as a result.

Stardust (Discovery 4)	7 February 1999	5535 Annefrank	Flyby	Successful	Closest approach of 3,079 kilometres (1,913 mi) at 04:50:20 UTC on 2 November 2002	Delta II 7426

Hayabusa (MUSES-C)	9 May 2003	25143 Itokawa	Orbiter/lander Sample return	Partial failure	Reached Itokawa on 12 September 2005, landed briefly on 19 and 25 November but sampler failed to operate, missed return window due to communications outage, finally returned to Earth on 13 June 2010	M-V

MINERVA	25143 Itokawa	Lander	Failure	Deployed from Hayabusa on 12 November 2005; Accidentally released while Hayabusa was moving away from Itokawa; reached escape velocity and drifted off into heliocentric orbit

Rosetta	2 March 2004	2867 Šteins	Flyby	Successful	Closest approach 800 kilometres (500 mi) on 5 September 2008	Ariane 5G+

21 Lutetia	Flyby	Successful	Closest approach 3,162 kilometres (1,965 mi) on 10 July 2010

Deep Impact (Discovery 7)	12 January 2005	(163249) 2002 GT	Flyby	Spacecraft failure (Extended mission)	Extended mission (EPOXI), flyby was expected in 2020, but communication with the spacecraft was lost in August 2013	Delta II 7925

New Horizons (New Frontiers 1)	19 January 2006	132524 APL	Flyby	N/A	Incidental flyby en route to Pluto, closest approach 101,867 kilometres (63,297 mi) at 04:05 UTC on 13 June 2006	Atlas V 551

134340 Pluto and its five moons.	Flyby	Successful	Flyby occurred on 14 July 2015

(486958) 2014 MU69	Flyby	Successful	Flyby occurred on 1 January 2019

Dawn (Discovery 9)	27 September 2007	4 Vesta	Orbiter	Successful	Orbited Vesta from 16 July 2011 to 5 September 2012, before departing for Ceres	Delta II 7925H

1 Ceres	Orbiter	Successful	Arrived in 2015

Chang'e-2	1 October 2010	4179 Toutatis	Flyby	Successful	Flyby on 13 December 2012, closest approach 3.2 kilometres (2.0 mi)	Chang Zheng 3C

Hayabusa2	3 December 2014	162173 Ryugu	Orbiter/lander Sample return	Operational	Arrived in 2018, landed in February 2019	H-IIA 202

HIBOU	Lander	Operational	Deployed from Hayabusa2 on 21 September 2018

OWL	Lander	Operational	Deployed from Hayabusa2 on 21 September 2018

MINERVA II-2	Lander	En route	To be deployed from Hayabusa2 during July 2019

MASCOT	Lander	Successful	Deployed from Hayabusa2 on 3 October 2018; operated for 17 hours

SCI inpactor	Impactor	En route	To be deployed from Hayabusa2

DCAM-3	Orbiter	En route	To be deployed from Hayabusa2, will be used to observe SCI impact

PROCYON	(185851) 2000 DP107	Flyby	Spacecraft failure	Flyby had been planned for 2016; cancelled due to ion engine failure in heliocentric orbit

OSIRIS-REx (New Frontiers 3)	8 September 2016	101955 Bennu	Orbiter Sample return	Operational	Orbiting 101955 Bennu since 31 December 2018	Atlas V

Lucy (Discovery 13)	2021	52246 Donaldjohanson	Flyby	Planned	20 April 2025

3548 Eurybates	Flyby	Planned	12 August 2027

15094 Polymele	Flyby	Planned	15 September 2027

11351 Leucus	Flyby	Planned	18 April 2028

21900 Orus	Flyby	Planned	11 November 2028

617 Patroclus	Flyby	Planned	2 March 2033

Psyche (Discovery 14)	2022	16 Psyche	Orbiter	Planned	2026	Falcon 9

ASTER	2021	(153591) 2001 SN263	Orbiter	Planned	Will orbit the triple system in 2022	TBD

Sentence(s)

The first spacecraft to visit an asteroid was Galileo, which flew past 951 Gaspra in October 1991; an incidental encounter while the probe was en route to Jupiter.

final_sentence: The first spacecraft to visit an asteroid was Galileo, which flew past 951 Gaspra in October 1991; an incidental encounter while the probe was en route to Jupiter.