NASAs DART mission proves it can save the planet from killer asteroids

Remember last September when NASA crashed a spaceship into an asteroid to see what would happen? Well, an investigation team led by the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Lab (APL) released a paper confirming that the successful Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) mission wasn’t just for fun; it proves that humanity can deflect asteroids and also actually save the planet.

NASA outlined the conclusion in a new blog post on Wednesday, explaining that the “kinetic impactor” technique, which APL writer Ajai Raj jokingly defines as “smashing a thing into another thing,” could indeed be used as an effective means of planetary defense.

“These findings add to our fundamental understanding of asteroids and build a foundation for how humanity can...

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