On Monday, a NASA spacecraft deliberately collided with an asteroid in an attempt to divert its course, in an unprecedented test aimed at teaching humanity how to prevent cosmic bodies from destroying life on Earth.
And the spacecraft, which is slightly smaller than the size of a car, collided, as expected, at 23:14 GMT with the asteroid at a speed of more than 20 thousand kilometers per hour.
And the US space agency transmitted the facts of this collision directly on the air. As soon as the spacecraft hit the asteroid, the NASA crew members who gathered at the mission supervision center in Maryland, in the United States, exploded with joy.
Minutes before the spacecraft collided with the asteroid “Demorphos”, which is 11 million km from Earth, the image of the object began to grow gradually as the spacecraft approached it more and more.
In a live transmission, the cameras on the spacecraft transmitted stunning images of the astronomical body that showed every detail of Demorphos, including its gray surface and the small pebbles covering it. The moment the vehicle hit the asteroid and crashed on it, the transmission of images stopped.
Don’t want to miss a thing? Watch the final moments from the #DARTMission on its collision course with asteroid Dimporphos. pic.twitter.com/2qbVMnqQrD
— NASA (@NASA) September 26, 2022
“We are on the cusp of a new era in which we have the potential to protect ourselves from dangerous asteroid impacts,” said Laurie Gleese, director of planetary sciences at NASA.
Demorphos, which is about 160 meters in diameter, poses no threat to Earth.
In fact, this small asteroid is a moon orbiting another larger asteroid called Didymos.
It takes Demorphos 11 hours 55 minutes to make a full circle around Didymus. But NASA seeks, through the mission that it carried out on Monday, to reduce this time by 10 minutes by reducing the orbit of Demorphos by bringing it closer to Didymus.
It will take anywhere from a few days to a few weeks to see if the trajectory of the small asteroid was really changed by the impact.
And this task will be carried out by scientists on Earth thanks to their telescopes.
(AFP)