The scenario has been played out in Hollywood several times. An asteroid the size of a continent is barreling out of control on a nonstop trip to Earth. Though it may seem far-fetched, this is a very real doomsday scenario for our tiny blue orb in this huge galaxy. This is why the latest NASA mission is so interesting. The DART project (Double Asteroid Redirection Test) aims to solve that problem without sending a bunch of old guys into space with drills and bombs. The project’s aim was to strike a test asteroid named Dimorphos (which is the size of a sports stadium) with a ballistic object the size of a vending machine. This is one of the few times a NASA mission succeeded when the spacecraft crashed.
The theory is that if the object can hit the asteroid with enough force, it can alter its trajectory to miss the Earth completely. And as of Monday, September 26th, the DART craft successfully crashed into Dimorphos at approximately 15,000mph! From what was stated on live stream, the impact was a resounding success, and the DART struck its target. But the real work starts now. It will take the teams at NASA and observatories worldwide to calculate the new orbital trajectory of Dimorphos. The optimal result will be shortening the orbital path by 10 minutes, but they state that 73 seconds is enough to be considered a success.
So next time you watch an asteroid disaster movie — instead of suiting up people to save the world, maybe they can suggest crashing something fast into the doomsday asteroid to save everyone a little time.