Japan's space agency JAXA has called off its launch of the Hayabusa2 asteroid-mining mission due to bad weather. It plans on sending the probe up next month. The plan is to send a probe to a far-flung space rock, blast a hole in it, grab some material, and return it to Earth.



JAXA said in a statement: "The launch of the H-IIA Launch Vehicle No. 26 (H-IIA F26) with the Asteroid Explorer 'Hayabusa2' onboard has been rescheduled as clouds including a freezing layer that exceeds the restrictions for suitable weather are forecast to be generated at around the scheduled launch time on November 30, 2014."

Using ion engines, the space probe will lift off next month and fly out to asteroid 1999JU3 by mid-2018. The craft will orbit the rock before dropping a bomb onto the surface.



The probe will then land, dig around In the blast hole, remove some of the material and then blast back toward home. It is expected to return to earth in 2020 or slightly later.