ESA: Mission to Smash Spacecraft into Asteroid Has an Official Target

After the Russian meteorite exploded over the Ural Mountains last week, it's not surprising that space agencies are now ramping up their efforts to detect and deflect asteroids that may impact Earth. In fact, a mission that aims to slam a spacecraft into a near-Earth asteroid now officially has a target--a space rock called Didymos.

The mission, which is a joint effort, is called the European/U.S. Asteroid Impact and Deflection Assessment (AIDA). The mission will aim to intercept Didymos in 2022, when the space rock will be located about 6.8 million miles from Earth. It will send two spacecraft on the mission--one will crash into the asteroid at about 14,000 mph in an effort to deflect it, while the other will stay nearby and record the dramatic encounter. Due to the speeds that are involved, the craft crashing into Didymos will most likely be vaporized.

Yet Didymos itself isn't a single asteroid. Instead, it's a binary system. A 2,625-foot-wide asteroid and a 490-foot space rock orbit each other. The spacecraft will crash into the smaller one. While Didymos poses no threat to Earth, scientists hope to learn all they can from the asteroid so that they can apply their findings to future threats to our planet.

"One effect would be a change in the orbital ballet of the two objects. AIDA is not intended to show how we could deflect an asteroid that threatens Earth, but it would be a first step," said European Space Agency officials in an interview with Redorbit.com.

The impact itself will allow scientist to not only see the change in trajectory, but will help them better improve models of space-debris collisions. It could be useful when examining possible collisions that could occur with satellites.

"The project has value in many areas, from applied science and exploration to asteroid resource utilization," said Andy Chang, AIDA lead, in a statement to Fox News.

Currently, the ESA is asking scientists from around the world to propose experiments that AIDA could carry out in space, or that could increase its scientific return from the ground. They have until March 15 to pitch their ideas.