Live: NASA satellite will collide with asteroid in suicide mission

At 17.4 million kilometers from Earth, the DART spacecraft hits its target, short for the Double Asteroid Redirection Test: the 780-metre asteroid Didymos, and specifically its target: the smaller Dimorphos rock, 163 meters, which is in the first orbit.

According to NASA’s estimation, Monday (26), at 20:14 (Brazilian time), DART will directly hit Dimorphos at approximately 6 kilometers per second. The expectation is that this impact will be enough to cause a change in the asteroid’s orbit.

DART is a small, low-cost spacecraft 1.8 m wide, 1.9 m long and 2.6 m high. Although this value is 570 kg at the time of collision, its total mass is 610 kg.

How to watch the collision between NASA’s DART and the asteroid?

DART’s “kamikaze” dive with the asteroid Dimorphos will be broadcast live on Monday, 26th. Coverage will begin at 19.00, On Brazilian time, on NASA TV and on the official YouTube channel.

In addition to the main stream, it will also be possible to watch a broadcast from DART from the DRACO camera (Didymos Reconnaissance and Asteroid Camera for Optical Navigation), will be in the last moments of the dive, taking a photo per second. At first – NASA warns – the screen will be completely dark, but they will appear at the end as they get closer to the asteroids.

Another recording will start three minutes after the collision., to record damage to the asteroid, and LICIACube (Italian Light Italian CubeSat for Imaging Asteroids) will be made by a small cube-shaped satellite the size of a shoebox. The Cube was “free-ride” in DART and will capture images and video and transmit it to Earth weeks later.