Japan just launched a spacecraft to bring pieces of Mars's moons home

At 4:41 in the morning on October 20, an H3 rocket lifted off from Tanegashima Space Center carrying JAXA's MMX spacecraft — the Martian Moons eXploration mission. About 71 minutes later, JAXA confirmed the spacecraft had separated cleanly and settled into its planned orbit. MMX is heading for Phobos and Deimos, the two small moons of Mars, aiming to land on Phobos, collect surface material and bring it back to Earth — a first that could reveal whether Mars's moons are captured asteroids or fragments of Mars itself, and how planets like ours got their water.