BepiColombo spacecraft captures stunning close-up images of Mercury's surface.

The BepiColombo spacecraft, a cooperative mission of the European and Japanese space agencies, completed its third of six planned flybys on June 19, 2023, and beamed back rare close-up images of Mercury. The crewless spacecraft grazed less than 150 miles above the surface as it harnessed the planet's gravity. BepiColombo seeks to study the polar craters filled with ice, the planet's magnetic field, and the enigmatic "hollows" on the surface. The mission will begin in earnest in 2025, after another scheduled flyby in September 2024.