Spooky, New Horizons did the same earlier this week.
Just after Dawn fired up its ion engines to begin spiraling down toward its third science orbit of Ceres on June 30, the spacecraft's protective software detected a problem of some sort, NASA officials said. As a result, Dawn quickly shut off its engines and went into safe mode.
Fighting back
Dawn's arrival in a stable orbit around Ceres was delayed after, close to reaching Ceres, it was hit by a cosmic ray, making it take another, longer route around Ceres in back, instead of a direct spiral.
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