DARMSTADT, Germany (AP) -- A deep space probe launched by the European Space Agency has successfully completed a flyby of an asteroid millions of miles from earth.
ESA announced Friday night that the Rosetta space craft had rendezvoused with the Steins asteroid, also known as Asteroid 2867 - currently in the asteroid belt between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter - at around 10:15 p.m. at a distance of just less than 500 miles. The deep space craft, launched in March 2004 from French Guyana, is 250 million miles from Earth.
The images and data Rosetta has collected will start beaming back to the earth and the results will be released on Saturday.
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