Saturday 10th December 2022 – 5.40pm WIB
LIVE Digital – China announced a mission plan to launch an unmanned spacecraft to prevent foreign objects such as asteroids or meteors from falling to Earth by crashing into them so that their orbits change.
Foreign bodies in the form of rocks space Known as 2020 PN1, this is a “potentially hazardous” asteroid about 40 meters across. The mission will launch with a Long March 3B rocket in 2026.
What China has done has been implemented by the Aviation and Space Agency United States of America or late NASA mission Double asteroid redirect test (DART) at the end of September this year, as quoted by the site SpaceSaturday 10 December 2022.
DART is collaborating with the European Space Agency or ESA’s Hera follow-up mission due to launch in 2024 and which aims to study the impact site in detail.
Meanwhile, China wants to accomplish this 2-in-1 “avoiding the apocalypse” mission by impact testing and making close-up observations all at once.
Lead exploration program designer moon China’s Wu Weiren said the latest plan calls for a mission to be launched in 2025 aboard the larger and more powerful Long March 5 rocket.
“We will launch two probes. The first one is for a survey. After studying it (the asteroid) thoroughly after the survey period, the second probe will execute an order to collide with the asteroid and hopefully deflect it by 3 -5 cm from its sure,” Wu said.
