NASA has announced that a mission to test its defenses against asteroids will take place on Nov. 23. The mission is scheduled to launch from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California.
The mission, entitled the Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART), involves the spacecraft being connected to a Falcon 9 rocket supplied by SpaceX, and then launched toward an asteroid system near Earth. The plan is for the spacecraft to travel for a year to the asteroid system, and then attach itself to a 525-foot diameter asteroid named Dimorphos.
The DART spacecraft will use a camera, nicknamed DRACO, and autonomous navigation software to make contact at a speed of 15,000 mph, according to masslive.com.
In a statement to NBC, NASA said, “The collision will change the speed of the moonlet in its orbit around the main body by a fraction of one percent, but this will change the orbital period of the moonlet by several minutes — enough to be observed and measured using telescopes on Earth.”
The DART mission will be the first to show off something NASA calls the “kinetic impactor technique”. The aim of this test is to change the course and motion of the asteroid. According to masslive.com, “The data collected will help NASA’s planetary Defense Coordination Office in furthering this technology to protect Earth.”
Although it is rare for large objects to enter Earth’s atmosphere, NASA says that over 900 asteroids within 1000 kilometers of Earth have been discovered since 1980. In an interview with WTTW, Chicago’s PBS station, astronomer and planetary scientist Mark Hammergren stated that the goal of this type of mission is to measure the asteroid’s response to the impact of the spacecraft.
When asked if these missions could theoretically change the course of an asteroid headed for Earth, Hammergren answered, “Small changes do add up over time. If we just change the speed of the asteroid by even something as low as maybe even a few millimeters a second, then that adds up over time. That’s a change in velocity. So you just multiply that by the time period – by the lead time you might have before an upcoming impact – all you have to do is get the asteroid to miss the earth by a few 1000 miles. If you have enough time, you can do that with the tiniest push.
Even though NASA is conducting this defense mission, earth is not currently under the threat of any asteroids, so there’s no need to worry about it just yet.
