We are less than two weeks from the first ever Double Asteroid Redirection Test mission, where NASA will test a new planetary defense system that involves slamming a satellite into an asteroid, opening a new era for the solar system.
While it won't be as dramatic as Bruce Willis and Ben Affleck's hit movie "Armageddon," DART will be a significant milestone for the space agency when it slams headfirst into a small asteroid on Sept. 26, destroying itself, NASA shared.
It is important to note that the asteroid NASA will hit, Didymos, is not on a collision course with Earth and is only being used for its size and current orbit.
But, the mission will test the DART system that could be used to avert any potential asteroids that would impact the Earth and threaten life.
NASA launched the project last fall, and its associate administrator for science, Thomas Zurbuchen, shared during a press conference that the goal is to stop any major impacts, should they be predicted.
"These objects are hurtling through space and have of course scarred the moon and, over time, also on Earth have had major impacts, have affected our history," Zurbuchen said.
It is still unknown if the DART satellite will cause a significant impact on the asteroid's orbit, and Zurbuchen shared that astronomers are looking into it.
"A series of new missions that we put in place are actually helping us understand and quantify those threats in an unprecedented fashion," Zurbuchen added. "DART is a first mission to try to really bump out of the way an object of threat in a direct experiment."
Almost 30,000 asteroids have been mapped that travel through the solar system and into the vicinity of Earth. Fortunately, they either don't align with Earth's orbit or are too small to make it through the planet's atmosphere before burning up.
However, scientists say that a potential impact from an asteroid in the future is still possible and could cause significant damage to the planet if it were to happen. Because of this, scientists want to be ready should the situation arise.
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NASA's theory is that if an asteroid is detected to have a collision course with Earth, it would be able to change its course and stop it from impacting the planet. DART's test on Sept. 26 will be the agency's first chance to test that theory.
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