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Here's where to watch NASA's Dart crash into an asteroid at 7:14 p.m. ET
For live NASA coverage starting 6 p.m:
For a stream of photos from the accompanying spacecraft, LiciaCube, starting 5:30 p.m.:
NYT: ... The DART mission isn’t like the movie “Armageddon.” Blowing up an asteroid generally would not be a good thing to do. Rather, the mission is a proof-of-principle demonstration that hitting an oncoming asteroid with a projectile can nudge it into a different orbit. For a dangerous oncoming asteroid, that nudge could be enough to change the trajectory from a direct hit to a near miss. ...
DART will essentially be a self-driving suicidal spacecraft, ... "You’re moving extremely fast,” said Elena Adams, the DART mission systems engineer. “And at that point, you cannot really send any commands. And so your system has to be very, very precise in how it’s controlling the spacecraft.” DART’s camera will not spot Dimorphos as a separate dot from Didymos until about an hour before the crash. Then it will adjust its flight path, ending in a glorious collision. “It is really hard to hit a very little object in space, and we’re going to do it,” Dr. Adams said.
DART will essentially be a self-driving suicidal spacecraft, ... "You’re moving extremely fast,” said Elena Adams, the DART mission systems engineer. “And at that point, you cannot really send any commands. And so your system has to be very, very precise in how it’s controlling the spacecraft.” DART’s camera will not spot Dimorphos as a separate dot from Didymos until about an hour before the crash. Then it will adjust its flight path, ending in a glorious collision. “It is really hard to hit a very little object in space, and we’re going to do it,” Dr. Adams said.
This is Earth from LiciaCube last Wednesday. Hey, I was there.
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NASA....
until we could see the boulders all over it. They achieved the incredible.
"Now the science begins."
