James Webb Caught DART Smashing Into Asteroid

This week, NASA performed the Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART), the first-ever planetary defence examine mission, in which it purposely collided with an asteroid to test whether or not the orbit of such a huge space rock could be moved.

The use of kinetic impactors is only one of several tools at our disposal for protecting Earth. This is a simple concept to understand: making little changes today may lead to large changes in the future, making the strategy particularly useful when utilised far in advance.

Many eyes on Earth and in the sky saw the September 26 test, during which the DART spacecraft collided with the small moon of the asteroid Dimorphos at 7:14 p.m. Eastern Time. JWST has provided the first photographs from space, after the steady arrival of data from ground-based telescopes.
Not only has JWST aimed itself in the direction of this groundbreaking expedition, but so have other space telescopes. The Hubble Space Telescope was also set to observe, but we have not yet seen the results. Data from NASA's Lucy mission, which is headed to the Trojan asteroids that share Jupiter's orbit, will be downloaded in October.

Join this channel to get access to perks:
   / @nasaspacenewsagency  

#dart #jameswebbspacetelescope #dimorphos #dartmission