NASA's Lucy Probe Snaps First Photo of 'Dinky' Space Rock

NASA's Lucy spacecraft, on its mission to study asteroids, has captured the first images of the smallest asteroid target on its agenda, a 0.5 mile-wide rock called Dinkinesh. The images were taken from a distance of 14 million miles away and show Dinkinesh as a speck of light. The spacecraft is scheduled to visit the Trojan asteroids, but Dinkinesh was added as a risk-mitigation exercise to test the spacecraft's tracking system. The flyby on November 1 will also help assess the accuracy of Lucy's pointing capabilities. The name Dinkinesh translates to "you are marvelous" and is a nod to the 3.2 million-year-old fossils of an early human ancestor nicknamed "Lucy."