In two months , the asteroid sample amass by NASA ’s OSIRIS - REx will come down to Earth . On September 24 , a capsule calculate like something from a sixty sci - fi show will fly through the standard pressure and land in the Utah desert . The team has practise the assembling of the capsule several times , and last week they were able to do the most naturalistic frock rehearsal yet , right where the ejection seat will come ram down .

The stage for this incredible legal transfer is the Department of Defense ’s Utah Test and Training Range . That ’s about 130 kilometers ( 81 Admiralty mile ) SW of Salt Lake City . OSIRIS - RExwill drop the capsule containing the sample and go forward to fly towards a dissimilar asteroid , thenotoriously unsafe Apophis . The capsule has no guidance , so it will land somewhere within an ellipse of 58 by 14 kilometers ( 36 by 9 mile ) .

The squad practiced collecting dirt samples , prepping the capsule for exile , and even flying the helicopter to where the space capsule will be brought back . There it will be get up and taken to NASA ’s Johnson Space Center , where its valued consignment will get down to be analyzed .

A helicopter practices transporting a mock sample capsule, packed for travel, at the Department of Defense’s Utah Test and Training Range.

A helicopter carrying the mock capsule during rehearsal.Image credit: NASA/Keegan Barber

“ That is where the science tin itself will be opened . It will be open in a specialized unclouded elbow room and inside a glovebox , ” Sandy Freund , the OSIRIS - REx delegation operations director for Lockheed Martin , antecedently toldIFLScience . “ The first time the sample will be exposed will materialise down at Houston . ”

On October 20 , 2020 , the ballistic capsule flew down towards the surface ofAsteroid Bennuto amass some ground . The goal was to get at least 60 grams ( 2 ounces ) of textile , but the delegation was actually too right . It collected so much hooey that some large rocks blocked the taste-tester oral sex , leading to some material flowing out . irrespective , NASA approximate that between 400 and 1,000 grams ( 14 - 35 ounces ) of material were garner .

Asteroid Bennu was selected because it is believed to have interchange very little since the geological formation of the Solar System . Studying its properties is like open a metre capsule left over from the birth of the planets .

OSIRIS-REx team members practice getting a mock sample capsule packed for its helicopter flight to a clean room on the Department of Defense’s Utah Test and Training Range. On July 18-20, 2023, the team rehearsed retrieving a mock sample capsule at the location where the real one, with samples of asteroid Bennu, will land on Sept. 24

The team practiced how to safely prepare the capsule for helicopter transport.Image credit: NASA/Keegan Barber