![]() Throughout that time, the spacecraft constantly logged its location with respect to Earth and to the asteroid. "We were able to go into orbit, we were able to leave orbit, we were able to get into a variety of imaging angles." "The trajectory of the spacecraft was really amazing - I compare it to a hummingbird," Dante Lauretta, a planetary scientist at the University of Arizona, the principal investigator for OSIRIS-REx and an author on the new research, said during the news conference. OSIRIS-REx (formally known as Origins, Spectral Interpretation, Resource Identification, Security-Regolith Explorer) launched in September 2016 and slipped into orbit around the asteroid Bennu in December 2018.Īfter its arrival, the spacecraft spent nearly two and a half years studying the space rock from orbit, swooping in, hovering overhead and inspecting the rock in every way possible. I think that, overall, the situation has improved. "I think that, overall, the situation has improved." Precision counts This is an archived article and the information in the article may be outdated."The impact probability went up just a little bit but it's not a significant change, the impact probability is pretty much the same," lead author Davide Farnocchia, who works at NASA's Center for Near Earth Object Studies in California, said during a news conference held Wednesday (Aug. Please look at the time stamp on the story to see when it was last updated.ĬAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. ![]() (AP) - The good news is that scientists have a better handle on asteroid Bennu’s whereabouts for the next 200 years. The bad news is that the space rock has a slightly greater chance of clobbering Earth than previously thought.īut don’t be alarmed: Scientists reported Wednesday that the odds are still quite low that Bennu will hit us in the next century. As a result, scientists behind new research now say theyre confident that the asteroids total impact probability through 2300 is just 1 in 1,750. This well-preserved, ancient asteroid, known as Bennu, is currently more than 200 million miles (321 million km) from Earth. Scientists previously said that the odds that Bennu would strike the Earth into 2200 was one-in-2,700, but those figures were adjusted to one-in-1,750 into the year 2300, The Associated Press reported. “We shouldn’t be worried about it too much,” said Davide Farnocchia, a scientist with NASA’s Center for Near Earth Object Studies at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, who served as the study’s lead author. engineer-can-i-put-sunglasses-on-the-earth-and-plunge-it-into-darkness/. While the odds of a strike have risen from 1-in-2,700 to 1-in-1,750 over the next century or two, scientists now have a much better idea of Bennu’s path thanks to NASA’s Osiris-Rex spacecraft, according to Farnocchia. “So I think that overall, the situation has improved,” he told reporters. The spacecraft is headed back to Earth on a long, roundabout loop after collecting samples from the large, spinning rubble pile of an asteroid, considered one of the two most hazardous known asteroids in our solar system. That uncertainty remains even in the new and improved models of Bennu’s future path, but with the OSIRIS-REx observations, scientists have been able to drastically reduce their uncertainty about Bennu’s fate … The samples are due here in 2023.Scientists’ patterns of asteroid trajectories always include some degree of uncertainty, as a multitude of forces drag a space rock as it rattles around the inner solar system. However, despite the best efforts of scientists, predicting Bennu’s course after 2135 is still difficult. Within that time period, the most concerning date is Sept. In September of that year, Bennu will swing past Earth, not close enough not to risk an impact, but certainly close enough for Earth’s gravity to push the asteroid a little in its path. 24, 2182 even on that day, Bennu’s impact probability is only 1 in 2,700. Beyond Bennu Of course, Bennu isn’t the only space rock that scientists worry about. ![]() Planetary defense is dedicated to identifying all asteroids that could potentially impact Earth in a meaningful way. The precision with which that dance takes place will shape Bennu’s trajectory over the next decades and centuries. ![]() Meghan Bartels, “Scientists fine-tune the odds of asteroid Bennu hitting Earth until 11pm with the help of the NASA spacecraft” on (11 August 2021)Ī paper discussing Osiris Rex’s findings is open access. NASA can use Osiris-RExs observations to fine-tune their understanding of. So far, NASA has cataloged 26,000 asteroids near Earth. Sure, Bennu only has a smidgen of a chance to hit Earth, but NASA would like. An asteroid is believed to have wiped out dinosaurs and many other types of life 66 million years ago.
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