A NASA spacecraft successfully crashed into an asteroid approximately 7 million miles from Earth in a test to determine if the impact can nudge the space rock slightly off course.
NASA launched its DART spacecraft in November 2021 with the express purpose of colliding with an asteroid about the size of a football stadium at 14,000 miles per hour.
The mission is NASA’s first demonstration of the agency’s planetary-defense initiative to protect Earth from the possibility of a hazardous collision with an asteroid. This particular asteroid, called Dimorphos, is not headed toward our planet but was singled out by NASA to test a deflection technique. If measurements show the asteroid’s course was even slightly altered, NASA will deem the mission a success.
