It’s not unusual for asteroids to flyby our planet or even enter our atmosphere in some form or another. But some are more threatening to life on Earth than others, and that’s why the Europeans and Americans are leading an international effort to test our planetary defense capabilities with their joint DART and Hera missions.
Deutsche Welle: What is the Hera, DART planetary defense mission?
This computer generated handout image released by the European Space Agency (ESA) on May 15, 2015 shows the impact of the DART (Double Asteroid Redirection Test) projectile on the binary asteroid system (65803) Didymos observed by the AIM (Asteroid Impact Mission) satellite.The Asteroid Impact Mission (AIM) is a European Space Agency’s mission, scheduled to be launched in 2020. AIM will travel to a binary asteroid system – the paired Didymos asteroids, which will come a comparatively close 11 million km to Earth in 2022. For a successful joint mission, one spacecraft, DART would impact the secondary of the Didymos binary system in October 2022 while AIM would first characterize the target asteroid (surface and internal properties), observe the impact event and measure any change in the relative orbit.
