At the end of November 2021 the POT he teamed up with the folks at SpaceX to launch the DART mission, which is one of his weirdest projects.
Since, as if it were the plot of an action movie, the objective of this adventure is basically to launch a ship into space with the sole purpose of crashing into an asteroid.
The essential purpose of the experiment is more than anything to have the opportunity to analyze how the use of this type of “projectiles” could work in the real world to modify the potential collision course of any star on its way to impact the Earth.
Applying this kind of maneuver, in theory, would work. But the most prudent thing to do would be to test it in safe conditions before being in a situation of real risk to humanity.
NASA’s DART mission already has a date for its crash
According to a report from Republic Worldthe space agency will carry out between September 26 and October 1 of this same 2022 the experiment where they will crash their DART ship against the Dimorphos asteroid to try to change its trajectory.
The exact day is yet to be determined, but what is already clear is that the impact of the module against the asteroid would happen at a minimum speed of 6.5 kilometers per second.
This generates a considerable shock where the energy of the impact will be comparable to that which would cause an explosion of three tons of TNT. This is the official NASA statement in this regard, where they measure the value of the project:
“The spacecraft will deliberately collide with a target asteroid, which poses no threat to Earth, to change its speed and trajectory.
If successful, the DART mission’s kinetic impact method could be used in the future if a dangerous asteroid on a collision course with Earth is ever discovered.”
Via his official Twitter account NASA itself has been releasing these latest details agreed on the DART mission, confirming that, following their usual protocol, they will make a live broadcast to provide all the details regarding the evolution of the mission.
Dimorphos is an asteroid that has an approximate diameter of 160 meters or 530 feet, this asteroid orbits around a larger asteroid, Didymos, with a diameter of 780 meters or 2560 feet.
The experiment at the end, with all the force that the shock impact represents, would actually only cause a slight change in the trajectory of the body, but it would be more than enough to verify the real proportions in which this type of maneuver would work.
In particular, this is the first mission dedicated to testing the technology to divert the path of an asteroid through a kinetic impact operation.