Short answers, pulled from the story.
The MESSENGER spacecraft launched on the 3rd of August 2004. A Delta II rocket carried the probe into a heliocentric orbit with a final velocity of 10.68 kilometers per second.
The journey to Mercury took six years, seven months, and 16 days covering 7.9 billion kilometers. The spacecraft flew by Earth once in 2005 and encountered Venus twice during the cruise phase before entering orbit.
MESSENGER entered orbit around Mercury on the 18th of March 2011 becoming the first spacecraft to achieve this feat. An eighteen-day commissioning phase tested all science instruments ensuring they survived the journey without damage.
Scientists announced the discovery of large amounts of water present in Mercury's exosphere on the 3rd of July 2008. Later findings revealed carbon-containing organic compounds and water ice inside permanently shadowed craters near the north pole.
The spacecraft crashed onto Mercury's surface on the 30th of April 2015 at 3:26 p.m. EDT creating a crater approximately wide. The impact occurred at 54.4° N latitude and 149.9° W longitude on Suisei Planitia near Janáček crater.