Meet the everyday people who helped NASA divert an asteroid from its course
NASA recently confirmed that its DART mission, the first planetary defense test, was a success, but the agency enlisted the help of 31 citizen scientists who watched the epic event unfold from their backyards.
Armed with Unistellar telescopes, these amateur astronomers observed and tracked how Dimorphos’ brightness changed before, during and after impact.
These data helped NASA scientists measure the mass of dust released when the box-shaped spacecraft slammed into Dimmorphos at 15,000 miles per hour, allowing them to confirm that the asteroid was pushed out of its orbit.
Dimorphos’ orbit went from 11 hours and 55 minutes to 11 hours and 23 minutes.
Scott Kardel, from California, told DailyMail.com: “The best results came from Reunion Island, where someone was positioned with their Unisterallar telescope to capture the event as it happened and watch the dust column lift off. [of the asteroid].’
“It’s amazing that they got that from such a small telescope, and that’s what makes this citizen scientist amazing — there’s someone somewhere in the world who can see something in space.”
NASA’s DART mission sent a spacecraft seven million miles into space. The ship crashed into Dimorphos, pushing the asteroid out of its orbit. Dimorphos’ orbit went from 11 hours and 55 minutes to 11 hours and 23 minutes
Scott Kardel, who lives in California, was one of 31 citizen scientists who captured an image of NASA’s DART mission from the ground. He said that seeing the column of dust that came off that asteroid was the most significant.
NASA launched its Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) in 2022, dubbed NASA’s “Armageddon moment.”
The ship’s target was a small moon called Dimorphos that orbited its parent asteroid, Didymos.
On September 26, the world watched as DART soared at 15,000 miles per hour toward Dimorphos to knock it out of orbit.
And on March 1, 2023, NASA confirmed that the mission was a resounding success.
The space agency’s refrigerator-sized satellite managed to remove 33 minutes from the orbit of a 520-foot-wide asteroid, nearly five times longer than anticipated.
The results published this month include observations made by citizens using a Unistellare eVscope2 telescope, which folds small enough to fit in a backpack.
Justus Randolph, who lives in Georgia, told DailyMail.com: “I was kind of watching the Super Bowl because I was doing science and also watching the live stream event.”
Kardel is associate professor of astronomy and assistant director of planetarium at Palomar College in San Marcos, California, and Randolph is a professor in the Mercer University School of Nursing.
Both are among 31 citizen scientists who published a paper about their observations published in February.
Justus Randolph also watched the event unfold from Georgia. He said it feels amazing to be a part of something like the NAS DART mission.
NASA recently confirmed that its DART mission was a success, but the agency enlisted the help of 31 citizen scientists who watched the epic event unfold from their backyards.
The group also collaborated with eight SETI Institute astronomers, led by SETI Institute Postdoctoral Fellow Ariel Graykowski.
“The timing of the observations during the DART impact and the continued monitoring of Didymos afterward was absolutely crucial for analyzing impact effects on Dimorphos,” Graykowski said.
‘Unistellar Network was the perfect tool to do just that!’
From ground-based observations of the impact, the Unistellar Network captured the sudden brightness by a factor of 10 of the Didymos system due to ejecta produced when the spacecraft struck Dimorphos.
These analyzes resulted in an estimated boost enhancement factor similar to that reported by the NASA DART team.
The Unistellar Network of Telescopes also measured a color change at the moment of impact, as they captured the moment of impact.
‘This whole mission was just one big experiment of can we really do this right? Can we hit an asteroid and move its orbit so it doesn’t hit Earth? Kardel said.
“NASA did the event, but didn’t really have anything up close to look at, but for the telescopes in the Unistellar network to see the event as it happened and the dust column that was ejected from that asteroid was the most significant thing.”
From ground-based observations of the impact, the Unistellar Network captured the sudden brightness by a factor of 10 of the Didymos system due to ejecta produced when the spacecraft struck Dimorphos.
NASA launched its Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) in 2022, dubbed NASA’s “Armageddon moment.” The ship’s target was a small moon called Dimorphos (pictured) circling its parent asteroid Didymos.
“It allowed people to determine how that energy got into the asteroid and how it launched things into space, and then continue to study the orbit of the small moon around the larger asteroid.
That gives you a chance to see that the orbit changed.
Citizen scientists determined that the impact had occurred at 6:15 p.m. -Travel time’, read in the study.
“We were able to do a lot of observations before the event, during the event, and then after the event, and it was thanks to the network that allowed us to do it. No one person could have done it alone,” Randolph said.