Japanese spacecraft Akatsuki Venus probe on 2nd orbital mission to Venus in December

#Akatsuki #JAXA #space #venus It would be a second chance for a Japanese spacecraft to orbit Venus in December – it would be five years after the first attempt failed. The Akatsuki probe was supposed to begin circling planet Earth's hellishly hot sister planet in December 2010, but the main engine of the craft failed during the crucial orbital-insertion burn.
From that day onwards, Akatsuki has been orbiting the sun and waiting for another opportunity to have a shot at Venus and that seems to have arrived.
It has been reported in space.com dated 6 April 2015 that officials at the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) have settled on a fresh date of 7 December for the second attempt.
The $300 million Akatsuki probe was launched in May 2010 and its mission was to help researchers better understand how Venus, which was similar to Earth in the solar system's early days, ended up being so hot and seemingly inhospitable to life.

Akatsuki had blasted off on the same rocket as JAXA's IKAROS (Interplanetary Kite-craft Accelerated by Radiation Of the Sun) spacecraft, which had become the first probe ever to travel through deep space using a solar sail.
Incidentally, the Akatsuki mission was Japan's second attempt to explore another planet by means of a robotic space probe. Its first interplanetary spacecraft, the Nozomi Mars orbiter, had also been riddled with problems after its launch, which occurred in 1998.
From the date, it would be obvious that Japan was much ahead of other countries in space research and travels to distant planets. International Space Station had been launched in November 1998.

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