NASA’s DART MISSION

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On November 24, NASA will launch the Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California.

About DART Mission: 

• DART mission is NASA's first-ever space mission to demonstrate asteroid deflection by a kinetic impactor technology

• The target of the spacecraft is a binary asteroid system called Didymos. In this system, Dimorphos orbits a larger asteroid named Didymos.

• Missions like DART are essential to help us understand how to stop dangerous asteroids.

Objective of the Mission

• The main aim of the mission is to test the newly developed technology that would allow a spacecraft to crash into an asteroid and change its course.

• After the mission has collided with the asteroid, scientists will study its impact on the trajectory of the asteroid with a range of telescopes deployed on different regions of the planet.

Reason for Choosing Dimorphos: 

• The Didymos system is an eclipsing binary as viewed from Earth, meaning Didymos and Dimorphos pass in front of each other

• Earth-based telescopes can study this variation in brightness to understand how long it takes Dimorphos to orbit Didymos.

• Didymos's orbit does not intersect Earth's at any point in current predictions thus posing no threat to Earth.