The Double Asteroid Redirection Test: NASA's First Planetary Defense Test Mission

  • Rivkin, Andrew S. (DART Investigation Team Lead Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory)
  • Published : 2021.10.13

Abstract

The Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) is NASA's first planetary defense test mission, designed to test the kinetic deflector technique by crashing into an asteroid and changing its orbit. DART's launch window opens in November, 2021, with arrival at its target less than a year later in late September or early October 2022. The target of the DART spacecraft is the moonlet Dimorphos, a 150-m moonlet orbiting the 780-m asteroid Dimorphos. By changing the orbit of Dimorphos around Didymos, the results can be detected much more easily than changing the orbit of an asteroid around the Sun. I will discuss what we know about Didymos and Dimorphos, the plans for the DART mission, the expected results, and how DART is important for planetary defense in general.

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