The first mission of its kind in history: the displacement of an asteroid that threatens Earth
The missile will hit its target in the early hours of September 27 GMT (Getty)
Just as in the “Hollywood” films, which talk about the end point through the impact of a great rock on the earth destroying life on it, and the readiness of humans to protect the earth from such a dangerous scenario.. the US space agency “NASA” is preparing to carry out a historic mission that is the first of its kind in a project to protect The Earth was struck by asteroids and space rocks, by sending a half-ton vehicle to collide with the asteroid "Demorphos", which does not pose a real threat to Earth, but rather the purpose of the experiment is to divert its path away from our planet.
Historic
mission The historic and unprecedented mission, preparations for it began on November 24, 2021, when the US Space Agency launched the "Dart" spacecraft from Vandenberg Base in California, carried on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket.
This project is the fruit of a joint collaboration between NASA and the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory. Its foundation stone was laid in August 2018, at a cost of $330 million, with the collision date set for September 26.
Changing the course
Whoever hears this news may feel terrified at first, but the US agency confirms that what is happening is just a scientific test of a collision with the asteroid "Demorphos" at a speed of more than four miles per second, in order to change its course in a simple way. If the mission is successful, it will mean that the US space agency and other space agencies can divert any asteroid heading towards Earth and avoid a catastrophic collision with it.
We note here that Demorphos is an asteroid the size of a football field orbiting closely around a five times larger asteroid called Didymos. This asteroid was specifically chosen because its relative proximity to Earth and its binary composition make it ideal for observing the results of the collision. According to the assumed plan, the scientists of the US Space Agency will measure the change in the orbit of "Demorphos" around "Dedimos" with telescopes on the ground, to see how successful the mission is.
Avoiding catastrophe
This experiment is an urgent necessity to protect the planet from the dangers from space. Although astronomers in the world confirmed that the chances of asteroids colliding with Earth are small, at least in the short term. However, they stress at the same time that it represents a threat, for which we must be prepared. All we need to do is look at past impact events such as the asteroid impact that led to the Chicxulub Crater.
When this asteroid hit the Earth 66 million years ago, it was hurtling about 24 times faster than a gunshot, resulting in a high-speed shock wave that flattened trees across the American continents, and its heat caused massive fires. This event led to the spread of huge amounts of debris in the atmosphere, which caused the photosynthesis of plants to stop, the dinosaurs to disappear, and 75 percent of all species and species became extinct. At the impact site, the picture was even more horrific. The rock from space left a crater about 32 kilometers deep in what is now the Gulf of Mexico, and nothing or living things have ever survived.
As a recent example of the danger posed by small asteroids and comets, a boulder that pierced Earth's atmosphere near the Russian city of Chelyabinsk on February 15, 2013 triggered a 400-kiloton explosion that injured more than 1,500 people. The famous British astronomer, Jay Tate, explained the seriousness of what happened at the time: “If this object had entered the atmosphere 20 kilometers north, it would have done more damage to the city. We were very lucky that we did not see large losses. We have to realize that this It will happen one day, and we should be prepared to do something about it."
To avoid a repeat of this catastrophic scenario, early detection of near-Earth asteroids is the first step in planetary defense. Scientists make nearly 30 new near-Earth asteroid discoveries every week. When it began preparing the Darat spacecraft at the beginning of 2019, NASA announced the discovery of more than 19,000 asteroids near Earth.
Prepare for the worst
Accordingly, this experiment will provide important data on how well spacecraft can protect Earth. "We know we've been hit by asteroids in the past," says Professor Alan Fitzsimmons, an astronomer at Queen's University Belfast and a member of the DART science team. "These impacts are a natural process and will happen in the future. We'd like to stop the worst of it." .
"This is the purpose of the DART mission. The spacecraft was launched last November and is scheduled to hit its target in the early hours of September 27 GMT. By carefully studying the trajectory of the asteroid after the collision, scientists believe they will better understand how it can be used Collisions similar to scattering Earth-bound asteroids and comets. We know there won't be any asteroids detected coming to us in the next 200 years or so. But we'll have to be prepared to act if we do find one on their way to Earth. And orbit is the first step to ensuring we have the right technology to deal with the threat.
Lindley Johnson, NASA's planetary defense officer, agrees with what Fitzsimmons said, stressing the importance of developing asteroid deflection technology as quickly as possible, saying, "We don't want to be in a situation where an asteroid is heading towards Earth and then we have to test That kind of ability."
The world will watch
In a few days, the spacecraft will launch an Italian handbag-sized probe, called the LiciaCube, equipped with two cameras that have been given the Star Wars names "Luke" and "Lea". Then, images of the asteroid impact will be recorded by the two cameras and returned to ground control units.
The US Space Agency will allow the world to watch the live broadcast, on September 26, at 7:14 pm EST, via its own YouTube channel. In addition, in 2024 the European Space Agency is scheduled to send a robotic spacecraft called Hera to Demorphos to study the crater left by Dart and analyze its collision with it.
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