The launch of the space probe “Psyche” towards an asteroid of the same name has been postponed by one day to Friday due to bad weather. NASA announced this on Thursday night. On board a “Falcon Heavy” rocket from Elon Musk’s private space company SpaceX, “Psyche” is scheduled to take off from the Cape Canaveral spaceport in the US state of Florida in the afternoon (4:19 p.m.).
The launch of the probe, which is about the size of a tennis court with its solar sails spread out, was actually planned for 2022, but had to be postponed due to computer problems. “Psyche” has to travel around 3.5 billion kilometers to the asteroid, which is why it can’t get there until 2029 at the earliest.
The asteroid “Psyche” orbits the sun between Mars and Jupiter. According to initial findings, it contains a lot of metals. The probe is intended to explore its composition and thus give researchers a better insight into the formation of asteroids, planets and our solar system.
