NASA Nudges Asteroid Out of Orbit

NASA’s trial of their asteroid-deflection strategy resulted in the DART space probe reducing the length of time Dimorphos takes to circle Didymos, by 32 minutes.

The attempt took place in late September, where DART struck the asteroid at 22,500 km/h. This caused the smaller asteroid, Dimorphos, to be forced nearer to Didymos, which it orbits.

Didymos, the 390m asteroid, and Dimorphos, the 160-metre minor-planet moon are not in any way dangerous to Earth. The goal of DART was to aid scientists in determining if a comparable impact may move a possibly dangerous asteroid out of its path before it collides with Earth.

Before the test, Dimorphos took 11 hours and 55 minutes to do a full circle of Didymos, however after the shift it was reduced to just 11 hours, 23 minutes.

Lori Glaze, director of NASA’s planetary science division, explained that “for the first time ever, humanity has changed the orbit of a planetary body.”

Originally in the initial planning stages, the team decided the bar for success would be if they managed to change the orbit time by at least 73 seconds, which they knocked out the park by more than half an hour. The asteroid gained extra velocity as the hit caused debris to shoot off in an opposite direction, acting in the same way as a rocket engine.

Although “this is a very exciting and promising result for planetary defence,” it was noted that the actual change was just 4%, therefore in order to implement this in the case of an asteroid heading towards Earth, “you’d want to do it years in advance”.

One of several initiatives aiming to provide an advanced warning is a space observatory known as the Near Earth Asteroid Surveyor.

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