NASA to crash a spacecraft against the asteroid, “moonlet Didymos”

The U.S space agency is planning to crash its unmanned spacecraft against an asteroid in its ‘defensive test’. It the space agency’s new project initiative, Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART). The project aims to test the efficiency of the kinetic impactor technique. The kinetic impactor technique will deflect the asteroid and prevent Earth from getting hit by an asteroid.

The initiative is aimed at changing the motion of the asteroid by using kinetic impact. Conducting a live test the initiative will test it on moonlet Didymos. The spacecraft moonlet Didymos will be launched from Vandenberg Space Force Base. According to reports, the spacecraft will be launched on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket.

The unmanned aircraft will travel millions of miles in the space and crash against the asteroid, moonlet Didymos. Pictures will be shot of the live demonstration by sending a small spacecraft that will get apart from the DART and take live pictures of the crash.The aircraft will capture valuable information when the real time event occurs. NASA aims to assess a real-life scenario through the demonstrtion. The mission is called a “defence-driven test”. It will help prevent Earth from impact of a real hazardous asteroid.

NASA says, the test of the kinetic impactor technique will be first of its kind that aims will deflect an asteroid in space. The project is in Phase C being carried out in Marshall Space Flight Center. The DART spacecraft will crash against the moonlet Didymos with a speed of 6.6 km per second. Autonomous navigation software will be used to control the speed of the spacecraft.