NASA confirms that DART mission changed asteroid's trajectory

Two weeks ago, NASA dropped a small spacecraft at a speed of about 24,000 km/h onto the asteroid Dimorphos in the Didimos-Dimorph system, with the aim of testing whether this method could be used to change the orbit of a potentially dangerous the Earth asteroids.

After the successful impact, the space telescopes turned their attention to the asteroid and the data they sent back proved the DART mission to be a complete success. NASA had set a minimum orbit change of 73 seconds (ie Dimorphos' orbit around Didimos), however, the probe's impact managed to slow its orbit by about 32 minutes.

NASA researchers, and especially the DART mission monitoring team, celebrated the success, but are quick to point out that in a possible future threat, things could be completely different. That is why the study of Dimorphos will continue closely and it is not excluded that something similar can be tried again on another asteroid.

Be that as it may, it is still a historic achievement for Humanity to have managed to influence the orbit of a celestial object.