$981 mn NASA spacecraft was bound for 8 asteroids, then this happened

tech.hindustantimes.com:

NASA's Lucy spacecraft was deployed successfully in October, 2021 with an aim to fly by a total of eight ancient asteroids to study "solar system's evolution". The spacecraft was designed to be the first mission to the Trojan asteroids that move along the asteroid belt. However, it immediately ran into an unexpected problem. According to the data from NASA, one of the solar arrays powering it, designed to unfurl, had not fully opened putting the $981 million Lucy space mission in trouble.

It was not easy to troubleshoot the problem. NASA's Lucy's anomaly response team consisted of members from the Southwest Research Institute (SwRI), NASA', spacecraft builder Lockheed Martin and the solar array system designer and builder Northrop Grumman.

Scientists discover that the source of the problem is a lanyard pulling Lucy's huge solar array and preventing it from opening up. It was likely snarled on its spool. The team identified two ways to open the Lucy's stuck solar panels- one was to pull the lanyard harder by running the array's backup deployment motor at once. Scientists commanded the spacecraft to simultaneously run the primary and backup solar array deployment motors on seven occasions in May and June. The efforts were successful and the motors together pulled the lanyard, opening and tensioning the array.

What is Nasa's Lucy mission?

The spacecraft named after an ancient fossil of a pre-human ancestor, Lucy, is the first solar-powered spacecraft to explore a group of rocky bodies known as the Jupiter Trojan asteroids. This is the first mission to run on solar energy while traveling billions of kilometers away from the solar influence.

Before reaching its destination, the spacecraft is supposed to conduct three Earth flybys