Kamikaze: A NASA spacecraft will collide with an asteroid - to change its trajectory

The US space agency has launched the unmanned spacecraft, and it will reach its destination in about a year - 11 million kilometers from Earth and at a speed of 24,000 km / h. "This is not going to destroy the asteroid.

It will only give him a little boost, "say the agency. The cost of the mission: $ 325 million

Yinon Ben Shoshan

24/11/2021

Wednesday, 24 November, 2021, 10:43 Updated: 12:20

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In the video, NASA launches a spacecraft that will resist steroids (Photo: Reuters)

NASA launched this morning (Wednesday) unmanned spacecraft in September 2022 is expected to crash into an asteroid Dimorfos in order to change its orbit. Mission, "Dart" name, was launched on a Falcon 9 launch of SpaceX.

The rocket company took off at about space 08:30 from Wandenberg Air Force Base in California. The total cost of the mission reaches $ 325 million. The space agency explains that the tiny spacecraft will transmit images to the control center until the moment of the collision, which will occur about 11 million kilometers from Earth - Relatively - and at a speed of 24,140 kilometers per hour.

Deformus, about 160 meters in diameter, orbits a larger asteroid, Didymus.

The mission will aim to divert the pair of asteroids from their orbit.

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Task Simulation (Photo: Reuters)

Launch the mission, tonight (Photo: AP)

The collision will make it possible to examine the structure of the celestial body and improve the accuracy of the capabilities of an encounter between an unmanned spacecraft and an asteroid.

"It's not going to destroy the asteroid. It's just going to give it a little boost," said mission clerk Nancy Chebot of Jones Hopkins Laboratory for Applied Physics.

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Launch the mission, tonight (Photo: AP)

"Although no known asteroid is currently in orbit on Earth, we know there are a large amount of asteroids in space somewhere far from here," said Lindley Johnson, a NASA planetary defense officer. "

After the collision with the asteroid, a tiny camera that will separate from the spacecraft will capture the moments of impact from a distance, document the pieces that will fly from the celestial body and the crater that will form in it.

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