NASA unveils three different views of spacecraft hitting asteroid
On the 26th, NASA used an orbiting spacecraft to perform a kinetic impact on a near-Earth asteroid. According to the Associated Press, on the 29th local time, NASA released new photos taken by the Hubble and Webb Space Telescopes, which caused concern.
On September 26, local time, NASA's "Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART)" spacecraft successfully hit a near-Earth asteroid named Dimorphos, trying to change the asteroid through kinetic energy impact running track. This is the world's first test aimed at defending Earth from the threat of an asteroid strike.
Space telescopes on every continent around the world are observing this process. On the 29th, new images released by NASA showed that a "giant crater" appeared after the impact of the asteroid Timofus, which caused a stream of rocks to splash into space, showing bright radiation.
The asteroid tripled in brightness after the impact, according to images captured by the Hubble Space Telescope, NASA said. The Hubble and Webb telescopes will continue to observe in the coming weeks, and scientists won't know the exact changes until November.
The experimental object selected by NASA this time is a "double asteroid" system. The impacted asteroid has a diameter of 160 meters, and it revolves around another asteroid with a diameter of 780 meters. The distance between the two asteroids is about 1 km.