NASA's DART mission successfully altered the orbit of the asteroid Dimorphos by striking it with a kinetic impactor. The collision shortened Dimorphos's orbit around its larger companion, Didymos, by approximately 33 minutes and even slightly changed the pair's trajectory around the Sun.
The mission demonstrated that a kinetic strike can effectively deflect a celestial object, with the ejected debris from the impact significantly boosting the spacecraft's nudging effect. This test validates a potential planetary defense strategy against asteroids that could threaten Earth.
The main topics covered are the successful outcome of the DART mission, the measured orbital changes, and the implications for future planetary defense.
NASA successfully deflected a small asteroid with its DART rocket, kinetic strike ejected a significant amount of debris from the asteroid — impact nudges the orbit of the small astronomical body, affecting the larger cosmic object as well
It's like playing billiards, but with a distance of millions of miles and a mass of more than a million tons.
Get Tom's Hardware's best news and in-depth reviews, straight to your inbox.
You are now subscribed
Your newsletter sign-up was successful
NASA just reported that the Double Asteroid Redirection Test, or DART, was successful in altering the orbit of the smaller body in a binary asteroid system. The space agency launched the DART probe in November 2021, taking nearly nine months before it hit the 560-foot or 170-meter-wide Dimorphos in September 2022. According to NASA, the agency, alongside several volunteer astronomers, observed the pair over several months, where it was noted that Dimorphos’ 12-hour orbit around its larger sibling, the 880-yard or 805-meter-wide Didymos, was reduced by around 33 minutes. More importantly, it also affected the system’s orbit around the Sun by 0.15 seconds.
DART is the first-ever mission that looks at the feasibility of conducting a kinetic strike to deflect any celestial threat to the Earth, and it seems that it was quite successful. The probe’s impact ejected a significant amount of debris from the asteroid, essentially doubling the DART spacecraft’s effectiveness. Even though only the smaller Dimorphos was targeted, the changes to its momentum and orbit also affected the larger Didymos.
The numbers mentioned might seem minuscule, especially when compared to the size of these celestial bodies, but NASA is banking on detecting any collision hazards to our home planet early on. By affecting its trajectory as soon as it's detected, even a small change can make a huge impact over the massive distances involved in space.
DART can make the difference
“The change in the binary system’s orbital speed was about 11.7 microns per second, or 1.7 inches per hour,” Rahil Makadia of the University of Illinois Urbanas-Champaign, the lead author of the study on the DART mission, told NASA. “Over time, such a small change in an asteroid’s motion can make the difference between a hazardous object hitting or missing our planet.” Although the DART’s target is pretty small and won’t destroy the entire planet, it still has the potential to wipe out an area the size of London and its surrounding areas. However, its larger companion is a bigger threat, with the capability of destroying the entirety of Southern England.
Thankfully, these two asteroids would’ve never impacted Earth, even after the DART mission. Still, NASA is concerned that there might be several other smaller rocks floating in space that could pose a danger to the planet. Because of this, the U.S. space agency is now building an orbiting telescope designed to detect incoming threats like asteroids and comets — the first such satellite designed for planetary defense. That way, it can find these early, and if there’s one that could potentially impact our home, NASA could send a kinetic impact vehicle early on to change its direction.
Follow Tom's Hardware on Google News, or add us as a preferred source, to get our latest news, analysis, & reviews in your feeds.
Get Tom's Hardware's best news and in-depth reviews, straight to your inbox.
Jowi Morales is a tech enthusiast with years of experience working in the industry. He’s been writing with several tech publications since 2021, where he’s been interested in tech hardware and consumer electronics.
Meridiano
