It's the stuff we would have only previously seen in Star Wars, a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away - last night, a NASA spacecraft zeroed in on an asteroid over 7 million miles away from Earth, crashing into it in the world's first attempt to shift the position of an asteroid.
The galactic collision between a harmless asteroid and NASA's Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) probe, took place on Monday (September 26) in the first-ever planetary defense test in history.
Per Space.com, the chief aim of the collision between DART and the asteroid - named Dimorphos - was to change Dimorphos' orbit around a larger space rock, Didymos, just enough to demonstrate that humans could effectively divert a dangerous asteroid, should one be headed towards Earth.
Speaking to Al Jazeera hours before the crash, Nancy Chabot, the mission coordination lead, stated: "This is a challenging test, and this is why we're taking these first steps now to develop this technology before we need it."
While Dimorphos did not actually pose a threat to Earth, it was important to determine whether an asteroid's trajectory could be altered using only kinetic force. It was hoped that, if successful, the method could be used to prevent catastrophic collisions. So, NASA launched DART into space in the SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket on November 23, 2021, hoping to find answers.
The team behind the NASA mission watched on as live footage was broadcast from DART, jumping up and down as the spacecraft sped towards its target. Upon impact, the feed went black.
Soon after the collision, DART's mission systems engineer at Baltimore's John Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, Elena Adams, told Space.com: "As far as we can tell, our first planetary defense test was a success [...] I think Earthlings should sleep better. Definitely, I will."
Taking to Twitter shortly before the collision, NASA shared a recreation video of how the crash would look, writing: "This is only a test – of planetary defense. Today, our #DARTMission is set to crash into a non-hazardous asteroid to test deflection technology, should we ever discover a threat."
DART - which weighed around 1,320 pounds - slammed into Dimorphos at a speed of 14,000 miles per hour, Space.com reported. The team behind the collision hoped to lessen the orbital track of the 534-foot-wide Dimorphos by around 10 minutes, but they revealed that 73 seconds would be sufficient enough to demonstrate that the method was effective, Al Jazeera detailed.
It is estimated that the total cost of the cosmic crash was approximately $330 million, and is just one of many asteroid explorations that NASA has been focused on in recent years. According to the US space agency, smaller asteroids - such as Dimorphos - are more commonplace and therefore have the potential to create larger threats.
After the historic collision, NASA posted a short clip of what DART's final moments on the collision course looked like, just in case anyone was suffering from a case of FOMO.
"THIS ONE IS FOR THE DINOSAURS," someone replied, evidently in reference to the humungous Chicxulub asteroid that wiped out Earth's dinosaurs 65 million years ago, causing their extinction. Sadly, the giant reptilian species obviously weren't able to identify and prevent potential hazards like we can today.
"The dinosaurs didn't have a space program to help them, but we do [...] So DART represents important progress in understanding potential hazards in the future and how to protect our planet from potential impacts," Katherine Calvin, NASA's chief scientist, told Space.com.
Well, I'd hate to be cliché but - this is definitely a small step for man, and a giant leap for mankind. And let us not forget: It may have taken a couple of million years, but this one is for the dinosaurs.
