– NASA has shut down the NEOWISE spacecraft after nearly 15 years of operations tracking near-Earth asteroids and comets in space.
– NEOWISE was originally called the Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE) mission and launched in 2009 to scan the entire infrared sky.
– In 2011 it was given a new mission called NEOWISE to survey near-Earth objects like asteroids and comets.
– Over its mission, NEOWISE discovered over 3,000 new near-Earth asteroids and 25 new comets. Its most famous discovery was Comet NEOWISE in 2020.
– NEOWISE helped lay the groundwork for its successor, the NEO Surveyor mission planned to launch in 2027 to continue tracking potentially hazardous objects.
– Increased solar activity caused Earth’s atmosphere to expand, increasing drag on the low-orbiting spacecraft. It could no longer maintain its orbit and is expected to burn up later this year.
– NASA decided to shut NEOWISE down after nearly 15 years of operations, calling it a successful and important mission for tracking near-Earth objects and planetary defense.
Source: Space
