NASA Plans To Crash A Spacecraft Into An Asteroid To Test A Planetary-Defense Method To Help Save Earth

NASA will use a spacecraft later this month to test a planetary-defense method to help save Earth. DART (Double Asteroid Redirect Test) is a spacecraft that will be used as a battering ram to crash into an asteroid close to Earth on Sept 26, according to NASA.

This international collaboration hopes to protect the whole world from future asteroid impacts.

“While the asteroid poses no threat to Earth, this is the world’s first test of the kinetic impact technique, using a spacecraft to deflect an asteroid for planetary defense,” NASA said.

According to the New York Post, DART should hit Dimorphos at 15,000 mph, which will test the kinetic impactor Earth defense theory.

“The point of a kinetic impactor is you ram your spacecraft into the asteroid you’re worried about, and then you change its orbit around the Sun by doing that,” Andy Rivkin said, according to the New York Post.

Andy Rivkin is an Applied Physics Laboratory Planetary astronomer at John Hopkins.