Reuters reported that the rocky moonlet was successfully moved from its natural route into a faster orbit by the spacecraft NASA deliberately crashed into an asteroid last month, the U.S. space agency reported on Tuesday. This is the first time humans have changed the motion of a celestial body through sheer kinetic force.
The seven-year-long, $330 million proof-of-concept mission also marked the first-ever testing of a planetary defense system intended to stop a doomsday meteorite collision with Earth, says Reuters.
The target asteroid was moved 32 minutes closer to the larger parent asteroid it orbits, according to astronomical measurements made during the previous two weeks, and its orbital period was also shortened.
This just in: The #DARTmission impact is confirmed to have changed the orbit of moonlet Dimorphos around its asteroid Didymos.
For the first time ever, humans changed the motion of a celestial object. More details: https://t.co/aQj8N7fnuV pic.twitter.com/NLR6AqEcaO
— NASA (@NASA) October 11, 2022
According to Reuters, NASA chief Bill Nelson told reporters that “this is a watershed moment for planetary defense and a watershed moment for humanity,” adding that “It felt like a movie plot, but this was not Hollywood.”
The DART (Double Asteroid Redirection Testimpactor) vehicle, which was barely larger than a refrigerator, crashed into Dimorphos at the end of the test flight at a speed of around 14,000 miles per hour (22,531 kph). Dimorphos, an egg-shaped parent asteroid about five times larger than Didymos and around the size of a football stadium, was DART’s celestial target.