Canada to get rare asteroid sample after OSIRIS-REx drops cargo to Earth on Sunday

Seven years after it blasted into space to snag a sample of an asteroid, a spacecraft is set to deliver its rare cargo on Sunday -- and Canada is getting a piece of the interstellar bounty.

Seven years after it blasted into space to snag a sample of an asteroid, a spacecraft is set to deliver its rare cargo on Sunday -- and Canada is getting a piece of the interstellar bounty.

The NASA-led mission launched OSIRIS-REx into space in 2016 to collect from the surface of an asteroid material that scientists hope will offer them insight into the formation of the solar system. The spacecraft began orbiting the asteroid -- called Bennu -- in 2018 and grabbed a sample in 2020.

It started its return trip to Earth in 2021, and a capsule with the rocks and space dust is expected to land in the Utah desert on Sunday, before the spacecraft continues on a mission to another asteroid.

Canada contributed a laser altimeter to the mission -- a device that measures altitude and distance -- that has allowed Bennu to become the "most precisely surveyed body in our solar system," says Cameron Dickinson, a staff engineer at Canadian space company MDA Ltd., which designed the Canadian component of the spacecraft.

By taking billions of measurements of the asteroid over two years, Canada's altimeter -- known as OLA -- helped scientists select the best location on the asteroid from which to gather a sample. The craft then briefly landed on the asteroid to collect the material.

"In total, we laid down more than three billion measurements ... so this now provides a very highly precise map of the asteroid, Dickinson told a recent news conference.

NASA's OSIRIS-REx is the first asteroid sample-return mission in which Canada has participated -- and it entitles the country to some of the space rocks.