Mercury spacecraft Mercury spacecraft BepiColombo is a joint Cornerstone mission between the European Space Agency (ESA) and JAXA of Japan to Mercury. The mission is still in the planning stages so changes to the current description are likely over the next few years. Due to budgetary constraints the lander portion of the mission (The Mercury Surface Element, or MSE) has been cancelled. However, Russia is interested in contributing with a lander as well as a few science instruments. ** The mission as currently envisioned involves two components: the Mercury Planetary Orbiter (MPO) build by ESA and the Mercury Magnetospheric Orbiter (MMO) build by JAXA. The two components could be launched together (on an Ariane 5) but the more likely baseline scenario at present is two launches on Soyuz- Fregat boosters in 2011 to 2012. The spacecraft will have a 3.5 year interplanetary cruise to Mercury using solar-electric propulsion and Moon, Venus, and Mercury gravity assists. ...more on Wikipedia about "BepiColombo"
Mariner 10 was an unmanned space mission launched on November 3, 1973 to fly by the planets Mercury and Venus. It was launched approximately 2 years after Mariner 9 and was the last spacecraft in the Mariner program (Mariners 11 and 12 were redesignated Voyager 1 and Voyager 2). ...more on Wikipedia about "Mariner 10"
The Mariner program was a series of unmanned interplanetary probes designed to investigate Mars, Venus and Mercury. The program included a number of firsts, including the first planetary flyby, the first planetary orbiter, and the first gravity assist. ...more on Wikipedia about "Mariner program"
The Mercury Surface, Space Environment, Geochemistry and Ranging (MESSENGER) is a NASA mission, launched August 3, 2004, designed to study the characteristics and environment of Mercury from orbit. Specifically, the scientific objectives of the mission are to characterize the chemical composition of Mercury's surface, the geologic history, the nature of the magnetic field, the size and state of the core, the volatile inventory at the poles, and the nature of Mercury's exosphere and magnetosphere over a nominal orbital mission of one Earth year. The mission will be the first time to return to Mercury in over 35 years — the last probe to visit Mercury was Mariner 10, which completed its mission in March, 1975. MESSENGER will offer several vast improvements in scanning ability, with cameras that can resolve surface features down to just 60 feet across (18 meters) compared to the one mile (1.61 kilometer) resolution offered by Mariner 10. MESSENGER will also be the first probe to image the entire planet; Mariner 10 was only able to observe one hemisphere that was lit during its flybys. ...more on Wikipedia about "MESSENGER"
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