Samsung cuts through the flaff with its Galaxy Tab S6 Lite, providing all the essential features you need at an affordable price
tech reviews9 hours ago
Nasa launched a spacecraft Tuesday night on a mission to smash into an asteroid and test whether it would be possible to knock a speeding space rock off course if one were to threaten Earth.
The DART spacecraft, short for Double Asteroid Redirection Test, lifted off from Vandenberg Space Force Base atop a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket in a $330 million project with echoes of the Bruce Willis movie “Armageddon.”
If all goes well, in September 2022 it will slam head-on into Dimorphos, an asteroid 525 feet (160 meters) across, at 15,000 mph (24,139 kph).
“This isn’t going to destroy the asteroid. It’s just going to give it a small nudge,” said mission official Nancy Chabot of Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory, which is managing the project.
Dimorphos orbits a much larger asteroid called Didymos. The pair are no danger to Earth but offer scientists a way to measure the effectiveness of the collision.
Dimorphos completes one orbit of Didymos every 11 hours, 55 minutes. DART’s goal is a crash that will slow Dimorphos down and cause it to fall closer toward the bigger asteroid, shaving 10 minutes off its orbit.
The change in the orbital period will be measured by telescopes on Earth. The minimum change for the mission to be considered a success is 73 seconds.
The DART technique could prove useful for altering the course of an asteroid years or decades before it bears down on Earth with the potential for catastrophe.
A small nudge “would add up to a big change in its future position, and then the asteroid and the Earth wouldn’t be on a collision course,” Chabot said.
Scientists constantly search for asteroids and plot their courses to determine whether they could hit the planet.
“Although there isn’t a currently known asteroid that’s on an impact course with the Earth, we do know that there is a large population of near-Earth asteroids out there,” said Lindley Johnson, planetary defense officer at NASA. “The key to planetary defense is finding them well before they are an impact threat.”
DART will take 10 months to reach the asteroid pair. The collision will occur about 11 million kilometers from Earth.
Ten days beforehand, DART will release a tiny observation spacecraft supplied by the Italian space agency that will follow it.
DART will stream video until it is destroyed on impact. Three minutes later, the trailing craft will make images of the impact site and material that is ejected.
Samsung cuts through the flaff with its Galaxy Tab S6 Lite, providing all the essential features you need at an affordable price
tech reviews9 hours ago
The country has several beaches and with that comes countless options to indulge in a hearty breakfast
food9 hours ago
In a touching Instagram post, Bipasha shared adorable pictures of themselves
entertainment9 hours ago
In this opulent saga, Bhansali delves into the world of Basra pearls
entertainment9 hours ago
The news comes just two days after his rape conviction was overturned by the New York Court of Appeals
entertainment9 hours ago
The AFI Life Achievement Award is the highest accolade granted by the American Film Institute
entertainment9 hours ago
The paths of these two stars have intersected on several occasions due to their association with the luxury brand Bulgari
entertainment9 hours ago
The students' demands range from a ceasefire in Israel's war with Hamas to calls for universities to stop investing in Israeli enterprises
world10 hours ago