It's about the size of the Great Pyramid and spans 525 feet. While it was never a threat to Earth, there are more asteroids of the same size in the same area. Humans would probably go the way of the dinosaurs if a bigger space rock were to hit us.
In 2005, Congress created a mandate for NASA to find asteroids larger than 500 feet in diameter, and so far the agency has detected and tracked almost all of the really huge near- Earth objects. According to Tom Statler, program scientist at NASA's Planetary Defense Coordination Office, less than half of the asteroids that are small have been found. If they were to hit the Earth, they would be large enough to destroy a city or country.
Statler says that this is the first time that something has been moved in our solar system to prevent a natural disaster.
Since 2015, the DART probe has been in the works. It was built and operated by the Applied Physics Laboratory at the University of Baltimore. AIDA is a collaboration between NASA and the European Space Agency. Astronomers are keeping their telescopes focused on Dimorphos and Didymos in order to measure the post- impact response.
Astronomers were only able to see Dimorphos and Didymos as a single dot of light. Calculating how often the smaller asteroid dims the larger one's light can be used to track it.
The craft's final approach was captured by its optical camera, which is similar to the camera aboard New Horizons. Only a few hours before impact, this much more close-up camera was able to see Dimorphos.
Within the last few minutes, we will be able to see what Dimorphos looks like, because you're coming in so fast. The surface features on the asteroid will be resolved within 30 seconds.
Scientists didn't know if the asteroid would be like a dust ball or a billiards ball. Is this moon a collection of pebbles or a giant rock? Carolyn said before the impact that they don't know. If the crash leaves an impact crater, scientists want to know how much the crash will change the asteroids trajectory.
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