NASA’s First Asteroid Samples Land on Earth After Release From Spacecraft

Recovery team members carry a capsule containing NASA's first asteroid samples to a temporary clean room at Dugway Proving Ground in Utah on Sept. 24, 2023. Rick Bowmer/Pool via AP Photo

NASA’s first asteroid samples fetched from deep space parachuted into the Utah desert Sunday to cap a seven-year journey.

In a flyby of Earth, the Osiris-Rex spacecraft released the sample capsule from 63,000 miles (100,000 kilometers) out. The small capsule landed four hours later on a remote expanse of military land, as the mothership set off after another asteroid.