Nasa’s first asteroid samples land on Earth after release from spacecraft

The capsule released by the Osiris-Rex spacecraft parachuting down to Earth (Nasa TV via AP)

Nasa’s first asteroid samples taken from deep space have parachuted into the desert in the US state of Utah.

In a flyby of Earth, the Osiris-Rex spacecraft released the sample capsule from 63,000 miles out. The small capsule landed four hours later on a remote expanse of military land, as the mothership set off after another asteroid.