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NASA's latest launch into outer space is going to have an impact. That's its entire mission.
The DART is scheduled to launch at 10:20 pm. NASA's first planetary defense mission will take place on Nov. 23 out of the Air Force Base in California. The mission will demonstrate the impact of an asteroid. It's a test run to see if we can find a way to collide with an asteroid.
The lead of the DART Observations Working Group at Northern Arizona University is excited to see the effects of the impact. She and her international team have been working for years to get a precise pre-impact of Dimorphos, the satellite asteroid, around Didymos, the primary asteroid in a near-Earth asteroid system.
The planet is not in danger from Didymos. An asteroid heading toward Earth is possible, and scientists throughout the world are working on ways to identify and mitigate potential threats. This technique, called the kinetic impact deflection, could be an important piece of a planetary defense system if this mission goes according to plan.
"DART is the next step in planetary defense," Thomas said. It is a simple test, but we will not fully understand what will happen until we do it.
The working group has been able to precisely constrain the characteristics of the satellite's position in the sky, and it was done using data from 2003 when the satellite was discovered.
The Dimorphos will return to its position in front of Didymos at consistent intervals. We want to have a complete picture of the current situation before we change it.
She and her team will continue to do observations after the collision to determine the change in the orbital period caused by the spacecraft's impact.
What is DART?
NASA's Double Asteroid Redirection Test is the world's first full-scale planetary defense test, demonstrating one method of asteroid deflection technology. DART is a focused mission, proving that a spacecraft can autonomously navigate to a target asteroid and collide with it at a rate of 6 kilometers per second. DART is part of NASA's larger planetary defense strategy and will test new technologies and provide important data.
There is more information at dart.jhuapl.edu.
Double Asteroid Redirection Test launch could be a key step forward in planetary defense.
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