NASA plans to collide a probe with a minor planet on Sept. 26 to knock it off course. According to NASA, the “Dart” (Double Asteroid Redirection Test) mission has nothing less at stake than “the future security of the Earth”. The collision will be streamed live.
It sounds like something out of a Hollywood movie, but it’s a NASA mission. “‘Dart’ is the first mission to attempt to use a direct experiment to eliminate a dangerous object,” said NASA Director of Science Thomas Zurbuchen. All this is very reminiscent of Hollywood movies like “Armageddon – The Last Judgment”, in which in 1998 stars like Bruce Willis and Ben Affleck destroyed an asteroid that was heading straight for Earth in a very short time using a complicated and dangerous maneuver.
However, the NASA mission, which costs about $330 million, is unmanned and the target asteroid Dimorphos is also not racing towards Earth, but is currently not a danger according to NASA calculations. It is a first tentative attempt to see if it might be possible to alter the orbit of an asteroid in this way. NASA hopes to gain insight into how to protect Earth from approaching asteroids.
27,000 asteroids near Earth
The space agency has been working on this for years. For example, an asteroid impact from about 66 million years ago is considered by scientists to be the leading theory of why the dinosaurs went extinct. Experts are currently unaware of asteroids that could go straight to Earth in the short term — but researchers have identified about 27,000 asteroids near our planet, about 10,000 of which are more than 140 meters in diameter.
The “Dart” probe, launched in November from the US state of California using a “Falcon 9” missile, has been en route to its target for about ten months. But it won’t be until about an hour and a half before the impact that the probe will be able to really target Dimorphos with its camera. According to NASA manager Evan Smith, it is “incredibly challenging” to aim the flying object precisely into the asteroid.
ESA mission “Hera” started in 2024
Dimorphos, about 160 meters in diameter, is a kind of moon of the larger asteroid Didymos. After the impact, Dimorphos’s orbit of about 12 hours is expected to be at least 73 seconds shorter and possibly up to 10 minutes shorter. For the scientists, then the real work begins: investigating exactly what happened before, during and after the impact – and what that could mean for the protection of the earth. In 2024, the ESA mission “Hera” should start for even more detailed research.
Source: Krone
I’m Wayne Wickman, a professional journalist and author for Today Times Live. My specialty is covering global news and current events, offering readers a unique perspective on the world’s most pressing issues. I’m passionate about storytelling and helping people stay informed on the goings-on of our planet.
