Two JAXA mission updates: Akatsuki Venus orbit entry and PROCYON Earth flyby coming up!

Akatsuki is finally approaching its second attempt to enter Venus orbit, on December 7. The mission is asking its fans to share messages and tweet #あかつき応援 ("Akatsuki cheer") in their support. Even astronaut Kimiya Yui is getting into the act of cheering on Akatsuki:

It looks like the best place for updates on Akatsuki's status is the mission's Twitter feed. They have successfully tested several of the cameras, and the rest of the science instruments will be checked out after orbit insertion. They also have rehearsed the day of orbit entry, coordinating with the Japanese ground stations at Usuda and Uchinoura as well as NASA's Deep Space Network. There is a detailed post summarizing Akatsuki's status and the plans for orbit insertion at spaceflightnow.com today.

I am really not sure what to think of Akatsuki's chances for orbit entry using nothing but its steering rockets, but I am confident that the mission engineers have done everything they possibly could to increase Akatsuki's chances for success. So my wishes for the Akatsuki Venus orbit entry attempt are for the aerospace engineer's favorite word: I wish everything is nominal! Go Akatsuki!

There is another Japanese spacecraft making a flyby right about now: PROCYON. PROCYON is a small test spacecraft, launched with Hayabusa2, whose ion engine failed earlier this year, so will not be able to steer to a rendezvous with a near-Earth asteroid as hoped. However, it appears that the rest of the flight system is still perfectly functional, and since it was launched on a course for an Earth flyby, it is going to do an Earth flyby, working engine or no! Gravity is great like that. The flyby will happen on December 3.

As it approaches, PROCYON is using its cameras to photograph Earth, and the mission is posting the images to its Facebook page. Here are three views of Earth from PROCYON:

And a lovely image of Earth and the Moon together.

It's sad that PROCYON won't meet its asteroid, but hopefully the university team working with the spacecraft is learning a lot from their otherwise successful deep-space operations. If these are the images we're getting from 8 million kilometers away, I'm looking forward to better and better photos as it gets closer!