Last September, NASA purposefully smashed a spacecraft into Dimorphos, a 160m-wide space rock orbiting a larger asteroid named Didymos. The goal of the mission, called DART (the Double Asteroid Redirection Test), was to demonstrate humanity’s ability to redirect hazardous asteroids away from Earth. That part of the mission was a success above and beyond all expectations. But now scientists are also learning more about the origins of the two asteroids. A study conducted in the wake of the DART impact found that Dimorphos is made from the same material as Didymos, and that the pair of asteroids likely originated from a single body.
Continue reading “Dimorphos is Probably a Piece of Didymos”Here's How NASA is Planning to Protect Earth From Asteroids and Comets

The large impact craters dotting our planet are powerful reminders that asteroids and comets strike the Earth from time to time. As often said, it’s not a question of “if”; it’s a matter of “when” our planet will face an impending strike from space. But an impact is one existential threat humanity is finally starting to take seriously and wrap its head around.
Seemingly spurred by the success of the Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART), NASA just released a new planetary defense strategy and action plan, describing its efforts to find and identify potentially hazardous objects to provide an advanced warning, and then even push them off an impact trajectory.
This 10-year strategy looks to advance efforts to protect the Earth from a devastating encounter with a Near Earth asteroid or comet.
Continue reading “Here's How NASA is Planning to Protect Earth From Asteroids and Comets”Didymos is Spinning So Quickly That Rocks are Detaching at its Equator and Going Into Orbit
Asteroid Didymos is spitting rocks out into space.
Last fall, when NASA’s DART mission impacted Didymos’ moon Dimorphos in a dramatic (and successful) attempt to change the object’s orbit, DART got a quick look at the Didymos system before the probe was purposefully smashed to pieces.
Alongside demonstrating the capability to prevent future asteroid strikes on Earth, DART also gathered new information about the dynamics of the pair of asteroids. The data collected suggests that Didymos is actively throwing material out into space, and there are likely millions of other small asteroids doing the same across the Solar System, all the time.
Continue reading “Didymos is Spinning So Quickly That Rocks are Detaching at its Equator and Going Into Orbit”What Kind of an Impact did DART Have on Dimorphos? The Science Results are Here

On September 26th, NASA’s Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) spacecraft collided with Dimorphos, the small moonlet that orbits the larger Near-Earth Asteroid (NEA) Didymos. The purpose was to test a planetary defense technique known as the kinetic impact method, where a spacecraft intentionally collides with a Potentially Hazardous Asteroid (PHAs) to alter its course. Based on a post-collision analysis, NASA determined that DART’s impact altered Dimorphos’ orbital period by 33 minutes and caused tons of rock to be ejected from its surface.
Since the collision, NASA has also been monitoring the cloud of ejecta produced by the impact to see how it has since evolved. The purpose of this is to better understand what the DART spacecraft achieved at the impact site, how much of it was delivered by the spacecraft, and how much was due to the recoil produced by the ejection. On December 15th, during the Fall Meeting of the American Geophysical Union (AGU) in Chicago, members of the DART team provided the preliminary analysis of their findings.
Continue reading “What Kind of an Impact did DART Have on Dimorphos? The Science Results are Here”It’ll be Tough to Stop an Asteroid at the Last Minute, but not Impossible
On September 26th, 2022, NASA’s Double-Asteroid Redirect Test (DART) made history when it rendezvoused with the asteroid Didymos and impacted with its moonlet, Dimorphos. The purpose was to test the “Kinetic Impact” method, a means of defense against potentially-hazardous asteroids (PHAs) where a spacecraft collides with them to alter their trajectory. Based on follow-up observations, the test succeeded since DART managed to shorten Dimorphos’ orbit by 22 minutes. The impact also caused the moonlet to grow a visible tail!
However, as Hollywood loves to remind us, there are scenarios where a planet-killing asteroid gets very close to Earth before we could do anything to stop it. And there is no shortage of Near Earth Asteroids (NEAs) that could become potential threats someday. Hence why space agencies worldwide make it a habit of monitoring them and how close they pass to Earth. According to a new study by a group of satellite experts, it would be possible to build a rapid-response kinetic impactor mission that could rendezvous and deflect a PHA shortly before it collided with Earth.
Continue reading “It’ll be Tough to Stop an Asteroid at the Last Minute, but not Impossible”The Smallest Radar Ever Sent to Space Will Probe the Interior of Dimorphos After its Impact From DART
Are miniature probes the future of deep space exploration?
Continue reading “The Smallest Radar Ever Sent to Space Will Probe the Interior of Dimorphos After its Impact From DART”Success! DART Impact Shortened Asteroid’s Orbit Time by 32 Minutes

NASA says its DART spacecraft caused a larger-than-expected change in the path of its target asteroid when they collided two weeks ago — marking a significant milestone in the effort to protect our planet from killer space rocks.
Ten months after it was launched, the Double Asteroid Redirection Test’s refrigerator-sized robotic probe crashed into a 560-foot-wide asteroid called Dimorphos on Sept. 26, as it circled a bigger asteroid known as Didymos. The paired asteroids were 7 million miles from Earth at the time, and posed no threat to Earth before or after the smashup.
Before the crash, DART’s science team said they expected the collision to reduce the time it took for Dimorphos to go around Didymos by about 10 minutes. NASA would have regarded any change in excess of 73 seconds as a success.
After the crash, detailed observations from ground-based observatories showed that the orbit was actually 32 minutes shorter — going from 11 hours and 55 minutes to 11 hours and 23 minutes. That’s three times as much of a change as scientists were expecting. Scientists also said Dimorphos appears to be slightly closer to Didymos.
“This is a watershed moment for planetary defense, and a watershed moment for humanity,” NASA Administrator Bill Nelson said today. “All of us have a responsibility to protect our home planet. After all, it’s the only one we have.”
Continue reading “Success! DART Impact Shortened Asteroid’s Orbit Time by 32 Minutes”The First Telescope Images of DART's Impact are Starting to Arrive
On September 26th, at 23:14 UTC (07:14 PM EST; 04:14 PM PST), NASA’s Double Asteroid Redirect Test (DART) spacecraft successfully struck the 160-meter (525 ft) moonlet Dimorphos that orbits the larger Didymos asteroid. The event was live-streamed all around the world and showed footage from DART’s Didymos Reconnaissance and Asteroid Camera for Optical navigation (DRACO) as it rapidly approached Dimorphos. In the last few seconds, DART was close enough that individual boulders could be seen on the moonlet’s surface.
About 38 seconds after impact, the time it took the signal to reach Earth, the live stream ended, signaling that DART had successfully impacted Dimorphos and was destroyed in the process. Meanwhile, teams of astronomers stretching from the Indian Ocean to the Arabian Peninsula watched the impact with their telescopes. One, in particular – the Les Makes Observatory on the island of Le Reunion in the Indian Ocean – captured multiple images of the impact. These were used to create a real-time video and show the asteroid brightening as it was pushed away, followed by material ejected from the surface.
Continue reading “The First Telescope Images of DART's Impact are Starting to Arrive”Watch a Nicely Stabilized Video of DART Flying Past Didymos and Slamming Into Dimorphos

Here’s one of the best videos we’ve seen of the last minutes of the Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) mission as it headed towards and slammed into the asteroid Dimorphos. This stabilized version of the last five-and-a-half minutes of images leading up to DART’s intentional collision with the asteroid was produced from NASA’s DART images. It was produced by the YouTube channel Spei’s Space News from Germany.
Continue reading “Watch a Nicely Stabilized Video of DART Flying Past Didymos and Slamming Into Dimorphos”This is the Last Thing DART saw as it Smashed Into its Asteroid Target

The first-ever planetary defense technology demonstration mission successfully conducted its mission, slamming into the surface of a distant asteroid and going out in a blaze of glory. NASA’s Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) spacecraft acted as a kinetic impactor, colliding with the small and harmless asteroid Dimorphos on September 26 at 7:14PM ET, with the hope of deflecting it.
Continue reading “This is the Last Thing DART saw as it Smashed Into its Asteroid Target”