DENVER, COLORADO, USA
This is what one of the two solar arrays for NASA’s Lucy probe looked like during testing, ahead of its launch in October 2021. It’s actually similar to what one of the arrays looks like now, after it failed to fully deploy. The circular arrays were designed to open like fans, but one got stuck, reportedly around 10° short of its 360° target.
The arrays will gather solar power for Lucy during its mission to explore the Trojan asteroids, which sit on Jupiter’s orbital path and are believed to remnants of the material that formed the outer planets of the Solar System. Lucy’s still got a long way to go to reach them (its ETA is August 2027), but, by the time you read this, the probe should have just completed the first of two flybys of Earth it needs to catapult it out to the Trojans.
NASA experts have been working to free the stuck array throughout 2022 and, in June, announced they’d made progress. The second array is now said to have reached 357° and should be capable of providing the power Lucy needs to complete its mission.