While the chances of a large asteroid hitting Earth anytime soon are considered remote, if such an event does ever occur, the consequences could be devastating. It’s therefore vital that we constantly observe the solar system for any hazardous asteroids coming our way. At the current time, NASA tracks around 28,000 near-Earth asteroids to assess…
Most space missions don’t intend to crash their spacecraft. But that’s just what NASA has in mind for its upcoming Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) mission, when it will smash a spacecraft into an asteroid to see if that’s a viable way to protect Earth from potentially dangerous asteroid impacts. The agency is preparing for…
Far out on the border of the outer solar system between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter lies the asteroid belt, where hundreds of thousands of small objects orbit the sun. Most of these objects are small rocky asteroids, but some are known to be 60 miles or larger across. Now, the European Southern Observatory…
Illustration showing NEA Scout with the solar sail deployed as it flies by its asteroid destination. NASA Following the success in 2019 of Bill Nye and the Planetary Society’s solar sail craft LightSail 2, NASA plans to launch its own solar sail project to investigate near-Earth asteroids. The Near-Earth Asteroid Scout (NEA Scout) is a small…