It's not often a probe gets a new lease on life, but Japan's Venus probe Akatsuki managed to enter orbit five years to the day after it failed an orbital insertion and drifted off into space.
It was a rare second act for a spacecraft, and Akatsuki's success was owed to some precise thruster firings that gave it a chance to re-encounter Venus five years later. It was still a tense day for the Japanese space agency, JAXA, as everything had to go just right for the probe to enter an elliptical orbit that would take it as near as 186 miles above the surface and as far away as 50,000 miles, far from its original intended orbit.
The original insertion failed when thermal problems sent the probe into safe mode before its encounter, one JAXA was unable to break before the encounter. The probe then entered an orbit that brought it inside the orbit of Venus, then slightly outside of it before coming back in for a re-encounter. Emily Lakdawalla of the Planetary Society put together this video showing the orbit of Akatsuki.
Now that the probe has safely arrived, it can begin characterizing the atmosphere and surface of Venus. At least one of the instruments will try to ascertain if there are active volcanoes on the surface of Venus today. Once the probe orients itself and ensures a proper orbit, the science mission can begin, just a half decade behind schedule.