A NASA spacecraft descended to an asteroid Tuesday and, dodging boulders the size of buildings, momentarily touched the surface to collect a handful of cosmic rubble for return to Earth.

By the time flight controllers heard back from Osiris-Rex, the action already happened 18.5 minutes earlier, the time it takes radio signals to travel each way between Bennu and Earth. It could take about a week to confirm that a sample is onboard, NASA says. Read more: Good News, Finally: Asteroids Zipping Past Earth Pose No Threat For Next 100 Years. A van-sized spacecraft with an Egyptian-inspired name, Osiris-Rex aimed for a spot equivalent to a few parking spaces on Earth in the middle of the asteroid's Nightingale Crater. al, Crucial part of OSIRIS-REx's mission to collect asteroid sample made possible by Canadian instrument, NASA's plan to scoop up dirt from asteroid hits a snag, Japan's Hayabusa2 probe lands on asteroid to collect samples, CBC's Journalistic Standards and Practices. DON'T MISSAsteroid Bennu NASA video: Watch OSIRIS-REx get up close to Bennu [VIDEO]Asteroid news: NASA identifies ‘potentially hazardous' space rock [INSIGHT]NASA news: Bright spots discovered on dwarf planet Ceres [PHOTO]. READ MORE: NASA discovery: Moon may have once protected Earth from solar rays. WATCH | A 3D animation of the asteroid Bennu: "We're going to be looking at a whole series of images as we descended down to the surface, made contact, fired that gas bottle, and I really want to know how that surface responded," Lauretta said. Want to discuss? NASA completed a long and complicated game of “tag” on Tuesday, when its OSIRIS-REx spacecraft successfully touched a near-Earth asteroid to collect a sample for the first time in the space agency’s history. NASA spacecraft grabs rock from speeding Bennu asteroid in historic first. Bennu's gravity was too low for the spacecraft to land — the asteroid is just 510 metres across.

Tuesday's operation was considered the most harrowing part of the mission, which began with a launch from Cape Canaveral back in 2016.

OSIRIS-REx cruised across the surface of the asteroid to a landing spot no bigger than five parking spaces in an operation dubbed Touch-and-Go (TAG). The OSIRIS-REx spacecraft launched in 2016 and travelled over 300 million kilometres to reach Bennu. The sample capsule will parachute into the Utah desert. OSIRIS-REx will make a second pass in January if this first one comes up empty.

Everyone alive today will be long dead by that point — but perhaps the film Armageddon will stand the test of time for that day when Bennu tries to tag us back.

Confirmation came from the Osiris-Rex spacecraft as it made contact with the surface of the asteroid Bennu more than 320 million kilometres away. Scientists want at least 60 grams and, ideally, closer to two kilograms of Bennu's black, crumbly, carbon-rich material — thought to contain the building blocks of our solar system. I look forward to analyzing the data to determine the mass of sample collected.”. Osiris-Rex took four and a half hours to make its way down from its tight orbit around Bennu, following commands sent well in advance by ground controllers near Denver. This is due to its particularly small size, with asteroid experts at NASA estimating it to be 31ft (9.5m) in diameter. Asteroid Bennu is of particular fascination to space scientists because it contains material from the early solar system, in addition to molecular precursors to life. An asteroid hurtling towards Earth at 25,000mph could strike the planet on the eve of the US general election, according to Neil deGrasse Tyson. U.S. spacecraft touches asteroid to grab sample, The Canadian Space Agency's OSIRIS-REx Laser Altimeter was crucial in mapping the asteroid Bennu ahead of its "touch-and-go" mission to collect samples that will be returned to Earth in 2023. Credit: Mike Daly, et. https://globalnews.ca/news/7409987/asteroid-nasa-osiris-rex-bennu