Dimorphos and the larger Didymos as they appeared after the DART crash
ASI/NASA
On 26 September, after travelling 11 million kilometres from Earth in nine months, NASA’s Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) craft slammed into the space rock Dimorphos. The goal was to see if we could change an asteroid’s path by flying a probe into it – and it was an unmitigated success.
Dimorphos is a small moonlet that orbits a larger asteroid called Didymos. Before the impact, Dimorphos circled Didymos once every 11 hours and 55 minutes. The crash moved it slightly closer and now an orbit takes only 11 hours and 23 minutes.
Images taken after the crash showed huge clouds of dust and debris blasted off the smaller asteroid, creating a recoil effect that pushed it closer to Didymos than if the impact hadn’t resulted in this debris.
While Dimorphos and Didymos pose no danger to Earth, this success demonstrates that if we were to spot an asteroid heading our way, crashing a spacecraft into it might shift its trajectory by just enough to make it miss Earth.
Figuring out exactly what happened within the asteroid when DART hit it will help us design those potential future missions to keep our planet as safe as possible.
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