NASA’s Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) recently struck Dimorphous with success.
- The first planetary defense technology demonstration in the world, called DART, intends to shield the planets from any potential collisions with extraterrestrial particles. NASA carried out this mission. On a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket, it was launched.
- A high-definition DRACO (Didymos Reconnaissance and Asteroid Camera for Optical Navigation) camera was aboard the DART mission to record the impact and its effects. The picture will be sent in real-time to the carth via DRACO. It will facilitate careful examination of the thing.
- DART’s collision with the asteroid Dimorphos serves as an example of a practical mitigation strategy for shielding the planet from an Earth-bound comet or asteroid.
- On-earth telescopes will monitor if this effort was successful in altering the asteroid’s trajectory.
- It’ll be a reasonably priced spaceship. It features two solar arrays that power spaceships using hydrazine propellant.
- Along with DRACO, it will also be equipped with a tiny satellite named LICIAcube from CUBESAT, which will be used to take pictures of the impact crater and crater left behind by the collision.
Dimorphos
| A bigger asteroid called Didymos orbits a smaller one called Dimorphous. To keep Dimorphos in its precise orbit, the Dart mission has altered its orbital period. In 2024, the European Space Agency will send the Hera probe to Dimorphos to make sure the moonlet is traveling in the right direction. 1. The mission’s objective is to determine how much the collision of DART changes the moonlet’s orbital velocity around Didymos. 2. According to experts, the collision will cause Dimorphos’ speed to change by less than 1%. 3. It should change the moonlet’s orbital period around the larger asteroid by several minutes, which is sufficient for telescopes on Earth to see and measure. |
Asteroids
| The belt of stony objects known as asteroids orbits the sun-like planets. They are substantially smaller than planets, despite the fact that they also orbit around the sun. Although there are many asteroids in our solar system, the Asteroid Belt, an area between Mars and Jupiter, contains the majority of these asteroids. Sometimes these asteroids deviate from their course and enter the gravitational field of the planet, posing harm to those who live there. |
Objectives
- In order to be ready in the event that an asteroid strikes Earth in the future, the mission’s goal is to test the new technology.
- The objective is to test recently created technology that might enable a spaceship to collide with an asteroid and alter its trajectory.
- The spacecraft is aiming for a tiny moonlet dubbed Dimorphos, which is Greek for “two forms.”
- Greek meaning “twin,” Didymos is a bigger asteroid that Dimorphos circles.
- As a result of the suicide mission, the spaceship will be utterly destroyed.
