Tag: asteroid
-
SpaceX launches Europe’s Hera asteroid mission ahead of Hurricane Milton
Two years ago, a NASA spacecraft smashed into a small asteroid millions of miles from Earth to test a technique that could one day prove useful to deflect an object off a collision course with Earth. The European Space Agency launched a follow-up mission Monday to go back to the crash site and see the…
-
Gaia detects more than 350 possible asteroid moons
Astronomers have found more than 350 possible moons around asteroids by analyzing data from the European Space Agency’s Gaia space telescope. While asteroids known to have moons, also known as binary asteroids, have been studied by Gaia before, this is the first time the telescope has been used to discover new binary asteroids. “Binary asteroids…
-
Using data from DART’s impact, scientists investigate characteristics of Dimorphos and Didymos
In September 2022, NASA’s Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) mission successfully slammed into the side of asteroid moonlet Dimorphos. Initial data from the event indicated that DART had successfully altered the orbit of Dimorphos and achieved its primary mission goal — to assess how much a spacecraft could deflect an asteroid through a transfer of…
-
Armada to Apophis—scientists recycle old ideas for rare asteroid encounter
For nearly 20 years, scientists have known an asteroid named Apophis will pass unusually close to Earth on Friday, April 13, 2029. But most officials at the world’s space agencies stopped paying much attention when updated measurements ruled out the chance Apophis will impact Earth any time soon. Now, Apophis is again on the agenda,…
-
New study finds that DART changed both orbit and shape of Dimorphos asteroid
On Sept. 26, 2022, NASA’s Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) spacecraft slammed into the side of the 170-meter-wide asteroid Dimorphos to test future asteroid deflection tactics in the event an asteroid was threatening Earth. Following impact, DART teams confirmed that the spacecraft’s collision with the asteroid had successfully deflected the asteroid by a small amount…
-
NASA’s Psyche captures its “first light,” continues testing other instruments
On Dec. 4, the cameras of NASA’s Psyche spacecraft took their first images 26 million kilometers away from Earth. This milestone, called “first light,” was one of many the agency needed to complete on its way to its destination, a metallic asteroid called 16 Psyche. The spacecraft is set to reach this asteroid in the…
-
Scientists will soon find out whether the Lucy mission works as intended
A little more than two years have passed since the Lucy mission launched on an Atlas V rocket, ultimately bound for asteroids that share an orbit with Jupiter. After a gravity assist from Earth in 2022, the spacecraft has been making a beeline for an intermediate target, and now it is nearly there. On Wednesday,…
-
NASA just launched the Psyche mission—no one knows what it will find
CAPE CANAVERAL, Florida—A roughly 3-ton spacecraft launched Friday from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida to begin a six-year trip to an enigma in the asteroid belt, an unusual metallic world the size of Massachusetts that could hold clues about the formation of Earth and other rocky planets. This mission, named Psyche, will survey its…
-
NASA finds water and organics in asteroid sample—possible clues to origin of life
JOHNSON SPACE CENTER, Texas—As they unveiled the first samples recovered from an asteroid on Wednesday, scientists were giddy at the prospects of what this material will tell us about the origin of our planet and possibly even ourselves. After seven years in space, a small spacecraft carrying samples from the asteroid Bennu landed in a…
-
NASA, SpaceX launch Psyche mission to metallic asteroid
NASA and SpaceX teams launched the agency’s Psyche mission to metallic asteroid 16 Psyche from Florida on Friday, Oct. 13. Psyche launched atop a SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket from Launch Complex 39A (LC-39A) at the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida. Launch occurred at 10:19 AM EDT (14:19 UTC). Psyche is the first mission…