In one of those extreme cases of Life Imitating Art and Science Fiction:
NASA says the spacecraft that intentionally slammed into an asteroid successfully changed its
course. As mentioned before, the Double Asteroid Redirection Test, or DART, was the first
attempt to change the direction of a celestial object to see if the method could be used to
protect Earth from a future deadly collision.
How well did it work? Yes! Land-based telescopes have determined the impact of the DART
spacecraft with asteroid Dimorphus changed its orbit around a larger asteroid by more than 30
minutes. A future mission will visit the double-asteroid system to further study the impact
area.
“This result is one important step toward understanding the full effect of DART’s impact with
its target asteroid” Lori Glaze, director of NASA’s Planetary Science Division at NASA
Headquarters in Washington says. “As new data come in each day, astronomers will be able to
better assess whether, and how, a mission like DART could be used in the future to help
protect Earth from a collision with an asteroid if we ever discover one headed our way.”