Monday, September 26, 2022

DART experiment is tonight!

 The DART spacecraft is scheduled to collide with asteroid Didymos at 7:14pm EDT (2314 GMT) tonight.

I'm going to be quite occupied at the time, but will be checking on the results as soon as we have them. Yes, there is a camera chasing it.

Succeed or fail, this test is a key element of developing a planetary defense system. We are going to learn something important tonight.

I hope the proof of concept works. A controlled impactor is probably the best way we currently have to deflect a dangerous asteroid from, say, turning Los Angeles into a crater.

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