NASA has proven that it can protect the Earth from asteroids - voila! technology

The moment of impact with a dimorphous asteroid (NASA)

Do you remember that last September NASA crashed a spacecraft into an asteroid to check if it could affect its trajectory? So the experiment, called DART (an acronym, but also the word dartboard in English), was crowned a success. A study published this month confirms that NASA's mission succeeded, and now humanity has the ability to deflect asteroids that could harm us and prevent scenarios like the one in the movie "Armageddon" (and no, Bruce Willis does not need to fly into space for this).

The American space agency detailed the main findings in its blog post this week, with the addition of an explanation that the "motional impact" technique, which is actually a fancy way of saying "what happens when a bone hits another bone", can indeed be used as an effective means of protecting the star.

"These findings add to our fundamental understanding of asteroids, and build a foundation for the principle that humanity could protect Earth from dangerous asteroids by deflecting their orbits," writes Nicola Fox, NASA's Assistant Administrator for Science. The findings are part of four studies published in the journal Nature. R", describing the DART mission from a research point of view.

"Humanity could protect the Earth from dangerous asteroids by tilting their orbit" (Photo: Reuters)

The mission, which took place on September 26, changed the orbit of the moon "Dimorphos" by 33 minutes (a minute as part of a degree, not the unit of time), according to the study.

DART's impact caused fallout from the asteroid, known as an ejecta.

The impact of the fallout, it turns out, contributed more to changing the asteroid's momentum than the impact of the missile itself.

According to the research, it will be possible to repulse with this method asteroids similar in scope to Dimorphos, with a diameter of about a kilometer, without the need for a preliminary observation mission.

However, the researchers warn that in order to prepare accordingly there should be adequate warning time - ideally decades or at the very least years before the estimated date of the impact.

Overall, the mission and research gives a sense of optimism about our ability to deal with large space rocks flying our way.

But the research ends on a relatively reassuring note: there is no known asteroid that directly threatens the Earth in the next century.

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