NASA will use a spacecraft to hit an asteroid later this month, testing future planetary defenses that could save Earth from asteroid strikes. NASA’s Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) mission will hit an asteroid not far from Earth with a test spacecraft weighing about 550 kilograms on Sept 26 EST to test the protection of Earth from Methods of an asteroid impact.
JOIN XIAOMI ON TELEGRAM
“Although this asteroid poses no threat to Earth, this is the world’s first test of kinetic energy impact technology, which uses the kinetic energy generated by the impact of the spacecraft to deflect the asteroid’s trajectory and complete planetary defense,” NASA said on Thursday, local time. ”
In November 2021, a Falcon 9 rocket owned by SpaceX launched from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California with a DART test spacecraft. After 10 months, DART will now pursue the target asteroid by performing three orbit correction maneuvers over the next three weeks. Each maneuver will reduce the margin of error for the spacecraft to hit the asteroid, the scientists say.
NASA said that after the final maneuver on September 25, 24 hours before the planned impact, the navigation team will determine the exact location of the asteroid Dimorphos, which is only 2 kilometers away from the spacecraft. The DART spacecraft will then automatically guide itself to collide with the asteroid.
