NASA Planning to Crash Satellite into Asteroid

NASA might have some very good news for those people who don’t sleep at night worrying that a huge asteroid might hit the Earth and destroy the entire humankind. It’s something completely natural to be a little bit concerned about this possibility, especially when there are so many people claiming that they know for sure something will hit our planet soon. However, in about ten years, NASA’s Double Asteroid Redirection Test spacecraft might solve this problem. it might do it in an even more amazing manner than Bruce Willis and Ben Affleck in the movie Armageddon.

A satellite to keep the world safe

If all goes according to the plan, NASA’s DART will begin its mission to redirect a nonthreatening object in 2024. Until then however, the spacecraft has only entered the preliminary design phase. The goal of this future mission will be to prove that something like this could be actually done. Especially in case a large object would threaten to hit the Earth. And with the right equipment, this could work very well.

According to NASA’s ambitious plans, the Double Asteroid Redirection Test is going to crash into the space object called Didymos B. It will have the speed of 6 km per second, which is about nine times faster than a regular bullet. After the impact, the scientists on Earth will observe how will it change its orbit around its bigger twin, Didymos A. The reason why scientists have chosen this asteroid to hit is that its 152 meters in diameter. So, the perfect size of an object which could pose a threat to our planet. If they will manage to move it, they will probably save the Earth.

It won’t happen soon

Andy Cheng, who is co-leading the DART investigation at the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory said that DART is the proof we needed that NASA can protect the planet in case of an asteroid threat. The Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory will actually build the spacecraft, which will be the size of a fridge. He also said that nobody knows the internal structure of an asteroid. This is why they will have to perform the test on a real one.

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