BepiColombo: Europe's mission to Mercury returns first pictures

Europe's BepiColombo mission has returned its first pictures of Mercury, the Solar System's innermost planet. The probe took the images shortly after it zipped over the little world at an altitude of just 200km (125 miles). Controllers have planned a further five such flybys, each time using the gravitational tug of Mercury to help control the speed of the spacecraft. The aim is for Bepi to be moving slow enough that eventually it can take up a stable orbit around the planet. The mission's first pictures of Mercury were snapped by low-resolution monitoring cameras on the side of the probe. For the moment, these are all that are available.

Bepi is not ready to deploy its high-resolution science cameras. They are tucked away inside what is referred to as the spacecraft stack.Bepi is essentially two spacecraft in one. One part has been developed by the European Space Agency (Esa), the other part by the Japanese space agency (Jaxa). The way these two components have been packed for the journey to Mercury obstructs the apertures of the main cameras.

Although Bepi is a long way from beginning proper science operations, quite a few of the probe's instruments were switched on for the flyby. Phenomena such as magnetic fields and some particles can still be sensed, even in the stack configuration.

"We'll get data back," Dr Suzie Imber, from Leicester University, UK, said, "but the purpose of the flyby, and the six flybys in total at Mercury, is to help us change our trajectory and slow us down.

"Eventually, in a few years from now in December 2025, our spacecraft and Mercury will be in the same place going in the same direction. And so, finally, we can separate our spacecraft, and get into orbit."