Posted on Sep 26, 2022
Move over, Bruce Willis: NASA is shoving an asteroid to test planetary defense
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https://www.npr.org/2022/09/26/ [login to see] /nasa-dart-shove-asteroid-first-test-planetary-defense
Nuclear bombs. That's the go-to answer for incoming space objects like asteroids and comets, as far as Hollywood is concerned. Movies like Deep Impact and Armageddon rely on nukes, delivered by stars like Bruce Willis, to save the world and deliver the drama.
But planetary defense experts say in reality, if astronomers spotted a dangerous incoming space rock, the safest and best answer might be something more subtle, like simply pushing it off course by ramming it with a small spacecraft.
That's just what NASA is getting ready to try, with a spacecraft that's scheduled to smack into an asteroid at 7:14 pm Eastern time on Monday.
The impact will be the culmination of NASA's Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART), a more than $300 million effort which launched a space vehicle in November of 2021 to perform humanity's first ever test of planetary defense technology.
"This really is about asteroid deflection, not disruption. This isn't going to blow up the asteroid," says Nancy Chabot, the DART coordination lead at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, who says the planned collision is just a nudge that's similar to "running a golf cart into the Great Pyramid."
Nuclear bombs. That's the go-to answer for incoming space objects like asteroids and comets, as far as Hollywood is concerned. Movies like Deep Impact and Armageddon rely on nukes, delivered by stars like Bruce Willis, to save the world and deliver the drama.
But planetary defense experts say in reality, if astronomers spotted a dangerous incoming space rock, the safest and best answer might be something more subtle, like simply pushing it off course by ramming it with a small spacecraft.
That's just what NASA is getting ready to try, with a spacecraft that's scheduled to smack into an asteroid at 7:14 pm Eastern time on Monday.
The impact will be the culmination of NASA's Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART), a more than $300 million effort which launched a space vehicle in November of 2021 to perform humanity's first ever test of planetary defense technology.
"This really is about asteroid deflection, not disruption. This isn't going to blow up the asteroid," says Nancy Chabot, the DART coordination lead at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, who says the planned collision is just a nudge that's similar to "running a golf cart into the Great Pyramid."
Move over, Bruce Willis: NASA is shoving an asteroid to test planetary defense
Posted from npr.org
NASA
Space
Posted >1 y ago
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We all know hollywood is fake (except for Baldwins case) but I'm pretty sure NASA is real PO1 William "Chip" Nagel
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PO1 William "Chip" Nagel
..."Tweaking a space rock's orbit
Dimorphos is around 7 million miles away and poses no threat to Earth. It's about 525 feet across and orbits another, larger asteroid.
NASA officials stressed that there was no way their test could have turned either of these space rocks into a menace.
"There is no scenario in which one or the other body can become a threat to the Earth," says Thomas Zurbuchen, associate administrator for the science mission directorate at NASA. "It's just not scientifically possible, just because of momentum conservation and other things."
Instead, the impact should slightly shorten the time it takes for Dimorphos to orbit its bigger asteroid pal. Right now, a full circuit takes 11 hours and 55 minutes. The DART impact should change the path of Dimorphos so that it moves closer to the big asteroid and takes less time to go around, doing so perhaps once every 11 hours and 45 minutes.
These two asteroids are so far away that telescopes see them as a single point of light that dims and brightens as Dimorphos goes around. Images from the DART spacecraft's camera were the first chance that scientists had to see the asteroid they had been working to hit.
The spacecraft's onboard navigation systems initially targeted the larger and easier-to-spot asteroid, only switching their attention to Dimorphos in the last hour of the mission.
In the final minutes before impact at 14,000 miles per hour, NASA lost the ability to send commands to the spacecraft as scientists simply watched and waited. Cheers erupted in the control room as the screen went red from loss of signal."...
..."Tweaking a space rock's orbit
Dimorphos is around 7 million miles away and poses no threat to Earth. It's about 525 feet across and orbits another, larger asteroid.
NASA officials stressed that there was no way their test could have turned either of these space rocks into a menace.
"There is no scenario in which one or the other body can become a threat to the Earth," says Thomas Zurbuchen, associate administrator for the science mission directorate at NASA. "It's just not scientifically possible, just because of momentum conservation and other things."
Instead, the impact should slightly shorten the time it takes for Dimorphos to orbit its bigger asteroid pal. Right now, a full circuit takes 11 hours and 55 minutes. The DART impact should change the path of Dimorphos so that it moves closer to the big asteroid and takes less time to go around, doing so perhaps once every 11 hours and 45 minutes.
These two asteroids are so far away that telescopes see them as a single point of light that dims and brightens as Dimorphos goes around. Images from the DART spacecraft's camera were the first chance that scientists had to see the asteroid they had been working to hit.
The spacecraft's onboard navigation systems initially targeted the larger and easier-to-spot asteroid, only switching their attention to Dimorphos in the last hour of the mission.
In the final minutes before impact at 14,000 miles per hour, NASA lost the ability to send commands to the spacecraft as scientists simply watched and waited. Cheers erupted in the control room as the screen went red from loss of signal."...
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