Latest news with #planetarydefense
Sustainability Times
16-07-2025
- Science
- Sustainability Times
'It's Going to Shatter the Moon!': Scientists Brace for 2032 Asteroid Impact That Could Ignite Earth's Skies with Apocalyptic Fury
IN A NUTSHELL 🌕 Asteroid 2024 YR4 is on a potential collision course with the Moon, possibly impacting in 2032. is on a potential collision course with the Moon, possibly impacting in 2032. 🚀 If it strikes, up to 220 million pounds of lunar rock could be ejected into space, creating a meteor shower. of lunar rock could be ejected into space, creating a meteor shower. 🛰️ The debris poses a significant threat to Earth's orbital infrastructure and satellites. and satellites. 🔭 This scenario offers a unique chance to test planetary defense capabilities against asteroids. In 2032, the skies above Earth may present a spectacular yet alarming display as an asteroid known as 2024 YR4 is on a potential collision course with the Moon. Although it no longer poses a direct threat to Earth, this scenario could lead to a shower of space debris with serious implications for satellites and orbital infrastructures. This event could transform the skies into a captivating yet hazardous theater, challenging our readiness to protect space assets. A City-Killer Spotted in Time Discovered in December 2024, 2024 YR4 measures approximately 200 feet in diameter. While it is not a planet-ending asteroid, it is large enough to annihilate a metropolis if it were to collide directly with Earth. Initial projections indicated a 3.1% probability of a collision with Earth on December 22, 2032. This relatively high probability immediately caught NASA's attention, triggering extensive monitoring and calculations. Fortunately, further calculations have ruled out any threat to Earth. For now, humanity can breathe a sigh of relief, but another celestial body could potentially be in the asteroid's path. As scientists continue to track 2024 YR4, the focus has shifted to the Moon, which lies within the asteroid's possible trajectory. A Man Uncovers $2 Million in Cash and 50 Gold Bars During Renovation—and Stuns Everyone by Calling the Police The Moon in the Crosshairs Since April 2025, astronomers have been closely monitoring a new potential trajectory: one leading to an impact with the Moon. This time, the numbers are slightly less reassuring. The probability of a lunar collision has risen from 3.8% to 4.3%, and this figure may fluctuate as observations become more precise. The final trajectory is expected to be confirmed around 2028, during the asteroid's next close approach. Should 2024 YR4 strike the Moon, the impact would be monumental. The implications of such an event extend beyond scientific curiosity; they underscore the need for vigilance and preparedness in space exploration and defense. 'China Prepares for War in Space': HQ-29 Missile System Can Destroy Satellites and Ballistic Threats Mid-Air A Sci-Fi Worthy Lunar Impact Researchers from the University of Western Ontario, specializing in solar system dynamics, have conducted simulations to predict the outcome of an asteroid impact on our natural satellite. The results suggest that up to 220 million pounds of lunar rock could be ejected into space. If the asteroid strikes the Moon's visible face, approximately 10% of this debris could be captured by Earth's gravity in the subsequent days. This debris would eventually burn up in Earth's atmosphere, creating a global light show—a spectacular meteor shower that could last for several days. Such a celestial event would be both breathtaking and perilous, highlighting the intricate balance between beauty and danger in space phenomena. 'Flying Car Opened Up a Whole New World for Me': Streetwing's Daring Design Ignites the Next Chapter in Pure Personal Exploration Celestial Beauty and Orbital Threat While this prospect may excite astronomy enthusiasts, it poses significant risks to space infrastructure. As astronomer Paul Wiegert notes, 'A rock one centimeter in diameter traveling at tens of thousands of feet per second is a cosmic bullet.' Such a particle could destroy a satellite or damage a crewed space station, such as the Chinese Tiangong station. The risk is compounded by the rapid increase in the number of satellites in orbit. By 2032, Earth's skies will be far more crowded with constellations of satellites for internet, navigation, weather, and defense. Researchers estimate that the probability of an impact with a satellite could increase by 1,000 times if debris projections hold true. An Opportunity to Test Planetary Defenses? This lunar scenario also presents a unique opportunity: testing human capabilities to deflect an asteroid before it poses a direct threat to Earth. Paul Wiegert considers 2024 YR4 an 'ideal target' for such a mission, akin to NASA's DART mission, which successfully altered the trajectory of the asteroid Dimorphos in 2022. However, caution is advised. If a deflection attempt fails or is poorly calculated, the asteroid could be redirected toward Earth, resulting in a far more catastrophic scenario. The delicate balance between proactive measures and unintended consequences must be managed with precision. The potential impact of 2024 YR4 on the Moon, while unlikely to threaten humanity directly, could disrupt vital space systems. It would offer an unprecedented celestial spectacle, unseen for millennia. As we consider the implications, we must ask ourselves: Are we truly prepared to defend our planet, even against an indirect strike? This article is based on verified sources and supported by editorial technologies. Did you like it? 4.7/5 (21)
Gizmodo
11-07-2025
- Science
- Gizmodo
Deflecting a Killer Asteroid Is More Complicated Than NASA Thought
In 2022, NASA rammed a spacecraft into an asteroid to see if it could alter its orbital period around its parent asteroid. The mission, dubbed the Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART), aimed to determine whether humanity could theoretically save itself from a catastrophic asteroid impact. DART collided with Dimorphos, a small moonlet orbiting a larger asteroid called Didymos, on September 26, 2022. The results of the impact blew NASA's expectations out of the water, shortening Dimorphos's orbital period by 32 minutes. Such a change would be more than enough to deflect a dangerous asteroid away from Earth, indicating that this strategy—the kinetic impactor technique—could save us if necessary. New research, however, complicates this success story. An investigation into the debris DART left behind suggests this technique, when applied to planetary defense, isn't as straightforward as scientists initially thought. 'We succeeded in deflecting an asteroid, moving it from its orbit,' said study lead author Tony Farnham, a research astronomer at the University of Maryland, in a statement. 'Our research shows that while the direct impact of the DART spacecraft caused this change, the boulders ejected gave an additional kick that was almost as big. That additional factor changes the physics we need to consider when planning these types of missions.' Farnham and his colleagues published their findings in The Planetary Science Journal on July 4. Dimorphos is a 'rubble pile' asteroid, a loose conglomeration of material such as rocks, pebbles, and boulders held together by gravity. This study only applies to this type of asteroid. Had DART collided with a more coherent, solid body, the impact wouldn't have produced these bizarre effects. Still, there are plenty of other rubble pile asteroids in the galaxy, so understanding how they respond to the kinetic impactor technique is important. The researchers analyzed images taken by LICIACube, an Italian Space Agency satellite that was mounted on the DART spacecraft. About two weeks before the impact, LICIACube separated and began following about three minutes behind the spacecraft, allowing the satellite to beam images of the collision and its effects back to Earth. In addition to observing the crater DART punched into the surface of Dimorphos, LICIACube captured the ejecta plume, or the cloud of debris ejected from the asteroid when DART hit it. These images allowed Farnham and his colleagues to track 104 boulders ranging from 1.3 to 23.6 feet (0.4 to 7.2 meters) wide. The rocks shot away from the asteroid at speeds up to 116 miles per hour (187 kilometers per hour). Strangely, the distribution of this ejected debris was not random, defying the researchers' expectations. 'We saw that the boulders weren't scattered randomly in space,' Farnham said. 'Instead, they were clustered in two pretty distinct groups, with an absence of material elsewhere, which means that something unknown is at work here.' The larger of the two clusters, which contained 70% of the debris, shot southward away from the asteroid at high speeds and shallow angles. The researchers believe these objects came from a specific source on Dimorphos—perhaps two large boulders called Atabaque and Bodhran that shattered when DART's solar panels slammed into them moments before the main body of the spacecraft hit. When the team compared this outcome to that of NASA's Deep Impact (EPOXI) mission, which punched a probe into a comet to study its interior structure, the distribution of the debris made more sense. Whereas Deep Impact hit a surface made up of very small, uniform particles, DART hit a rocky surface packed with large boulders. This 'resulted in chaotic and filamentary structures in its ejecta patterns,' coauthor Jessica Sunshine, a professor of astronomy and geology at the University of Maryland who served as principal investigator for Deep Impact, explained in the statement. 'Comparing these two missions side-by-side gives us this insight into how different types of celestial bodies respond to impacts, which is crucial to ensuring that a planetary defense mission is successful,' she said. The 104 ejected boulders carried a total kinetic energy equal to 1.4% of the energy of the DART spacecraft, and 96% of that energy was directed to the south, representing 'significant momentum contributions that were not accounted for in the orbital period measurements,' the researchers state in their report. The force of debris exploding away from Dimorphos upon DART's impact could have tilted the asteroid's orbital plane by up to one degree, potentially causing it to tumble erratically in space. 'Thus, a full accounting of the momentum in all directions and understanding the role played by surface boulders will provide better knowledge of how the specifics of the impact could alter—either reducing or enhancing—the effects of a kinetic impactor,' the researchers write. Astronomers have catalogued roughly 2,500 potentially hazardous asteroids in our corner of the galaxy. These are space rocks that can come alarmingly close to Earth and are large enough to cause significant damage upon impact. While there is currently no known risk of one of these asteroids hitting our planet within the next century, developing strategies to prevent such a catastrophe could someday prove lifesaving. The success of the DART mission suggests that NASA is on the right track, but this new study shows we still have much to learn about the effects of the kinetic impactor technique.
Forbes
30-06-2025
- Science
- Forbes
In Honor Of World Asteroid Day, A Short History Of Planetary Defense
World Asteroid Day started with a real bang. An artist's illustration of asteroid Bennu On June 30, 1908, an asteroid about 65 meters wide collided with Earth's atmosphere and exploded several miles above Siberia; the force of the blast flattened and burned millions of trees over an area of more than 2,000 square kilometers. Today, the anniversary of the Tunguska blast has become World Asteroid Day: a science holiday co-founded by a rock music legend and an Apollo astronaut. In 2015, Apollo 9 lunar module pilot Rusty Schweickart helped launch World Asteroid Day with astrophysicist and Queen guitarist Brian May. The United Nations officially recognized the event a year later in 2016. Earlier this month, Arizona senator Mark Kelly – also a former astronaut – introduced a Senate resolution that, if passed, would officially recognize June 30 as World Asteroid Day in the U.S. I spoke with Kevin Schindler, resident historian at Lowell Observatory in Arizona, about the origins of World Asteroid Day, the history of planetary defense, and what asteroids can reveal about the history of our Solar System. Discovering the Danger from Outer Space Around 200 years ago, in the 1830s, geologists began to study fossils and figure out that several mass extinctions had wiped out whole ecosystems of species on Earth in the distant past. 'In recent decades, they realized that those weren't necessarily caused by something on Earth, but by something impacting from space – like the Cretaceous Tertiary boundary,' says Schindler. An artist's impression of a giant meteor impact. In the 1960s, geologist Walter Alvarez discovered a thin layer of black clay in rocks around the world. Below the black line, the rocks were rich in fossils; above it, they were nearly barren. The same layer of black clay showed up all around in the world: in rock outcroppings in Italy and New Zealand, and in samples from the floor of the Pacific Ocean. And it clearly marked a deadly before-and-after moment in Earth's history – one that happened around 66 million years ago. Alvarez suspected that the black clay was something alien; it contained bizarrely large amounts of an element called iridium, which is vanishingly rare here on Earth but more common in asteroids. He began to realize that an asteroid or comet may have slammed into our planet 66 million years ago, kicking off a mass extinction and scattering iridium-rich black dust over the planet like a burial shroud. The pieces came together in 1978 when geophysicists Glen Penfield and Antonio Camargo discovered the outline of a crater hundreds of kilometers wide at the edge of Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula. Its center lies at the bottom of the Gulf of Mexico. Penfield and Camargo named the crater for one of the communities that now lies within its boundaries: Chicxulub Pueblo. Other craters – smaller but still impressive – also make it obvious that our planet has had more than a few run-ins with meteors during its long history. 'And while there's not as much debris floating around in our Solar System as when it was newly-formed, there's still stuff out there,' says Schindler. 'And it's inevitable that at some point that stuff will come back and get us again.' NASA's Asteroid Watch tracks known asteroids and comets in the Solar System, while observatories ... More like Lowell scan the skies for more. From Deep Impact to DART So we've known almost 60 years that asteroids and comets could threaten life on Earth. 'In the 1980s and 1990s, there was a search to look for bodies that specifically could impact Earth,' says Schindler. 'Phase one of all this started with, 'okay, let's look for these bodies that could hit us,' and then a couple decades later is when we got to phase two, 'what can we do about it if we do find these things?'' Strangely enough, it was a pair of high-budget, low-scientific-accuracy Hollywood blockbusters that really brought planetary defense to public attention, according to Schindler. The summer of 1998 featured not just one but two movies about humanity trying to save itself from extinction by blowing up an incoming chunk of space rock. In Armageddon, a wildly-improbable effort by a team of offshore drillers saves Earth from an asteroid impact; in Deep Impact, a similarly-improbable effort fails to save Earth from a comet (so the summer ends in a cinematic tie). Two men in a space suit using a piece of machinery in a scene from the film 'Deep Impact', 1998. ... More (Photo by) 'The good thing about those movies is that, even though they're not scientifically accurate in every way, they certainly built awareness enough to where lawmakers said, you know, we should put some money aside to study this stuff more,' says Schindler. 'Hollywood, in some ways, has helped the cause to learn more.' And, as science fiction often does, Deep Impact and Armageddon provided thought experiments (albeit not super-accurate ones, to put it mildly) for the ideas that would eventually become actual efforts at planetary defense. According to Schindler, theoretical ideas about whether we could destroy an incoming meteor eventually shifted to ideas about just nudging the deadly object off-course. 'This is just something that's really been developed in the last decade or so and – I wouldn't say culminated, but really became well-known with the mission that went up to deflect the moon of an asteroid to see if it was possible,' says Schindler. Artist rendering of the NASA Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) space probe approaching the ... More asteroid Didymos and its minor-planet-moon Dimorphos. The DART spacecraft aims to collide with Dimorphos in autumn 2022 in order to study the effect of an impact with near-Earth objects. Created on September 13, 2021. (Illustration by Nicholas Forder/Future Publishing via Getty Images) That mission was NASA's Double Asteroid Redirection Test, or DART, in which an intrepid little spacecraft flew 7 million miles to crash into the asteroid Dimorphos and knock it off-course. Dimorphos is actually a mini-moon that orbits another, larger asteroid called Didymos. Astronomers at Lowell carefully measured Dimorphos's orbital path around its parent asteroid before and after the impact – and they saw evidence that DART had succeeded in knocking Dimorphos into a different orbit. It's a long, long way from deflecting one tiny asteroid moonlet onto a different path around its parent asteroid to deflecting something the size of the Chicxulub impactor – or even Tunguska – as it's barreling toward Earth. But the consensus seems to be that DART was a good start. 'The biggest thing, I think, was that it is possible. This was a very controlled initial step,' says Schindler. 'This was certainly promising enough that we should keep doing these tests in different sizes of body and different compositions, because depending on what it's made of, a body might react differently to something impacting it.' Fossils of the Early Solar System This illustration depicts the 140-mile-wide (226-kilometer-wide) asteroid Psyche, which lies in the ... More main asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter. Meanwhile, Schindler and World Asteroid Day also want the public to know that asteroids are more than potential threats: they're an orbiting treasure trove of information about the history of our Solar System and even the origins of life. Most asteroids are chunks of rock that coalesced early in our Solar System's history but never grew massive enough to become planets; they're like the seeds of planets that might have been. Others are the debris left behind by collisions between objects in those chaotic early days of the Solar System, when planets were forming and gas giants migrated, scattering lesser objects in their wake. 'They tell us what the early composition was and what a chaotic time it was in the early part of our Solar System,' says Schindler. Those clues are written not just in the chemical and physical makeup of asteroids, but in their orbital paths around the Sun. By studying and modelling how those paths have changed over the years, scientists can reconstruct how asteroids and planets may have interacted. The orbits of modern asteroids are like the 'footprints' of planet formation, migrating gas giants, and long-ago collisions. Today, NASA's Lucy mission is exploring the asteroid belt, getting up close and personal with several of these objects. Meanwhile, NASA's OSIRIS-APEX mission is on its way to study the asteroid Apophis, which will pass close (but not too close!) to Earth in 2029. The surface of asteroid Bennu, as seen by OSIRIS-REX in late 2020, is strewn with boulders. 'And now we are studying planetary systems around other stars. Better understanding our Solar System, we can now look at others and see how typical we are,' says Schindler. 'You don't know that without knowing your own Solar System pretty well, so it really has helped us to learn about, sort of, our heritage, I guess.' World Asteroid Day World Asteroid Day aims to tie all of those things together, promoting awareness of planetary defense but also of the immense scientific value – and maybe monetary value, eventually – of asteroids. At Lowell Observatory, that awareness is hard to escape; the observatory stands just an hour's drive from Meteor Crater – which is exactly what the name suggests, a 213-meter-deep, 1200-meter-wide crater where an object about the size of a Boeing 747 slammed into the desert floor around 50,000 years ago. 'The proximity of Lowell Observatory, where we're studying bodies in space, and Meteor crater, where we've seen the result of one of those bodies hitting Earth – how convenient is that? We're looking at both ends of it, from when it's still up in space to the final product if something like this hits.'
The Guardian
28-06-2025
- Science
- The Guardian
‘It's something that happens': are we doing enough to save Earth from a devastating asteroid strike?
It is a scenario beloved of Hollywood: a huge asteroid, several miles wide, is on a collision course with Earth. Scientists check and recheck their calculations but there is no mistake – civilisation is facing a cataclysmic end unless the space rock can be deflected. It may sound like science fiction, but it is a threat that is being taken seriously by scientists. Earlier this year, researchers estimated that asteroid YR4 2024 had a 3.1% chance of hitting Earth in 2032, before revising that likelihood down to 0.0017%. This week, new data suggested it was more likely to hit the moon, with a probability of 4.3%. If that happens, the 53- to 67-metre (174ft-220ft) asteroid previously called a 'city killer' will launch hundreds of tonnes of debris towards our planet, posing a risk to satellites, spacecraft and astronauts. Before that, in April 2029, 99942 Apophis – an asteroid larger than the Eiffel Tower – will be visible to the naked eye when it passes within 32,000km of Earth. This attention-grabbing close encounter has prompted the UN to designate 2029 as the international year of planetary defence. When it comes to apocalyptic asteroid strikes, there is precedent, of course. Most scientists believe such an event hastened the demise of non-avian dinosaurs 66m years ago. 'This is something that happens,' said Colin Snodgrass, a professor of planetary astronomy at the University of Edinburgh. 'Not very often, but it is something that happens. And it's something that we could potentially do something about.' As Chris Lintott, a professor of astrophysics at the University of Oxford, told the UK parliament's science, innovation and technology committee this week, the risk posed by an asteroid originating beyond our solar system is minimal. Instead, he said, the greater threat comes from those in our cosmic back yard. 'Most asteroids in the solar system exist in the asteroid belt, which is between Mars and Jupiter, but they become disrupted, usually by encounters with either of those planets, and they can move into orbits that cross the Earth,' said Lintott, who presents the long-running BBC astronomy series The Sky at Night. 'Then it's just a case of whether we're in the wrong place at the wrong time.' The chances of an enormous asteroid – the type that did for the dinosaurs – hitting Earth is admittedly low. 'We think there's one of these every 10m to 100m years, probably,' Lintott told the Guardian. 'So I think you'd be right to ignore that when you decide whether to get up on a Thursday morning or not.' Snodgrass said there were 'precisely four' asteroids big enough and close enough to Earth to be considered 'dino-killers', and added: 'We know where they are, and they're not coming anywhere near us.' But damage can also be done by smaller asteroids. According to Nasa, space rocks measuring about one to 20 metres across collided with Earth's atmosphere resulting in fireballs 556 times over 20 years. Many collisions have occurred over the oceans, but not all. 'Chelyabinsk is the best example,' Lintott said. In 2013, a house-sized space rock – thought to have been about 20 metres across – exploded in the air above the Russian city with a force of nearly 30 Hiroshima bombs, producing an airburst that caused significant damage and hundreds of injuries, mostly from broken glass. Less dramatically, in February 2021 a space rock thought to have been just tens of centimetres across broke up in Earth's atmosphere, with fragments landing in the Cotswold town of Winchcombe in the UK. Thankfully, the damage was confined to a splat mark on a driveway. The types of asteroids we should perhaps be most concerned about are those about 140 metres across. According to Nasa, asteroids around that size are thought to hit Earth about once every 20,000 years and have the potential to cause huge destruction and mass casualties. The space agency has a congressional mandate to detect and track near-Earth objects of this size and larger, and a suite of new technological advances are helping them do just that. On Monday, the first images from the Vera C Rubin observatory in Chile were released to the public. This telescope is expected to more than triple the number of known near-earth objects, from about 37,000 to 127,000, over a 10-year period. In just 10 hours of observations, it found seven previously unspotted asteroids that will pass close to the Earth – though none are expected to hit. Also in the offing, though not planned for launch before 2027, is Nasa's near-Earth object (Neo) surveyor. Armed with an array of infrared detectors, this is 'the first space telescope specifically designed to detect asteroids and comets that may be potential hazards to Earth', the agency says. Lintott said: 'Between those two, we should find everything down to about 140 metres.' He said such observations should give scientists up to 10 years' warning of a potential collision. The European Space Agency (Esa) is planning a near-Earth object mission in the infrared (Neomir) satellite. Slated for launch in the early 2030s, this will help detect asteroids heading towards Earth that are at least 20 metres in diameter and obscured by the sun. Assessing the emerging capabilities, Edward Baker, the planetary defence lead at the UK's National Space Operations Centre (NSpOC) at RAF High Wycombe, said: 'I think we're in a good place. I can't see a situation like [the film] Don't Look Up materialising at all – though I wouldn't mind being portrayed by Leonardo DiCaprio.' As our ability to spot near-Earth asteroids increases, Lintott said, we should get used to hearing about asteroids like YR4 2024, which initially seem more likely to hit Earth before the risk rapidly falls towards zero. He described the shifting probabilities as similar to when a footballer takes a free kick. 'The moment they kick it, [it looks like] it could go anywhere,' he said. 'And then as it moves, you get more information. So you're like: 'Oh, it might go in the goal,' and then it inevitably becomes really clear that it's going to miss.' Of course, scientists aren't just monitoring the risks to Earth. They are also making plans to protect it. In 2022, Nasa crashed a spacecraft into a small, harmless asteroid called Dimorphos that orbits a larger rock called Didymos to test whether it would be possible to shift its path. The Dart mission was a success, reducing Dimorphos's 12-hour orbit around Didymos by 32 minutes. In 2024, Esa launched a follow-up to Nasa's Dart mission, called Hera. This will reach Dimorphos in 2026 and carry out a close-up 'crash site investigation'. It will survey the Dart impact crater, probe how effectively momentum was transferred in the collision and record a host of other measurements. Esa hopes this will provide crucial insights that can be used to make deliberate Dart-style impacts a reliable technique for safeguarding Earth. 'Dart was much more effective than anyone expected it to be,' Lintott said. 'And presumably that's something to do with the structure of the asteroid. I think we need to know whether Dart just got lucky with its target, or whether all near-Earth asteroids are like this.' For the most part, scientists say the threat of an asteroid strike does not keep them up at night. 'We're safer than we've ever been and we're about to get a lot safer, because the more of these things we find, the more we can spot them on the way in,' Lintott said. As Esa has quipped on its merchandise: 'Dinosaurs didn't have a space agency.'
Gizmodo
28-06-2025
- Science
- Gizmodo
Rubin Observatory's Stunning Result Proves It's a ‘Game Changer' for Spotting Dangerous Asteroids
Astronomers usually keep their eyes on the sky, but on Monday, June 23, the community turned its attention toward Washington, D.C., as scientists from the Vera C. Rubin Observatory unveiled the telescope's first images. Many have waited more than 20 years to see Rubin in action, and its initial findings did not disappoint. Rubin, a joint initiative of the National Science Foundation (NSF) and the Department of Energy's (DOE) Office of Science, recently conducted its first 10 hours of test observations. In just that short period, the observatory produced dazzling images and discovered more than 2,000 previously unknown asteroids, including seven near-Earth asteroids. None of them pose a threat to our planet, but through this wealth of new data, the observatory has already proved to be a game changer for asteroid hunters working on planetary defense. By conducting unprecedentedly fast and detailed surveys of the entire southern sky, Rubin will allow scientists to find and track more space rocks than ever before. 'As this camera system was being designed, we all knew it was going to be breathtaking in what it delivered, but this has exceeded all our expectations,' Richard Binzel, a professor of planetary sciences at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and inventor of the Torino Scale—a tool for categorizing potential Earth impact events—told Gizmodo. Data on those 2,000 new asteroids went directly to the International Astronomical Union's Minor Planet Center (MPC), the globally recognized organization responsible for cataloging and disseminating data on asteroids, comets, and other small celestial bodies. It plays an essential role in the early detection and monitoring of asteroids that threaten Earth. The MPC has spent years preparing for the deluge of data from Rubin, ramping up its software to process massive amounts of observations. When the first round officially came flooding in on Monday, it was 'nerve-racking and exciting simultaneously,' Matthew Payne, MPC director, told Gizmodo. This was just a taste of what's to come. In a few months, Rubin will begin the Legacy Survey of Space and Time (LSST), a decade-long, near-continuous survey of the southern sky. This will produce an ultrawide, ultra-high-definition time-lapse record of the universe. In terms of asteroids, that means the MPC will receive about 250 million observations per year from LSST, according to Payne. 'For us, that's a game changer in the total amount of data that we're getting, because at the moment we get somewhere in the region of 50 to 60 million a year,' he said. Rubin's remarkable abilities stem from its remarkable instruments. Equipped with a unique three-mirror telescope design and the largest digital camera ever built, this observatory can conduct all-sky surveys while still detecting very faint objects like asteroids. This bridges a key gap between existing technologies, Payne explained. When hunting space rocks, 'you need to go as deep as possible,' Peter Veres, an MPC astrophysicist, told Gizmodo. 'That's what the LSST does, and none of the survey telescopes in the world that aim at planetary defense do that.' During this 10-year survey, Rubin will observe the cosmos on an automated schedule using its 27.6-foot (8.4-meter) Simonyi Survey telescope. Each 30-second exposure will cover an area about 45 times the size of the full Moon. Then, the enormous LSST camera will capture wide-field images and stitch them together to create a complete view of the southern sky every three nights. The combination of Rubin's huge field of view, short exposure time, and its ability to rapidly sweep the sky will yield an avalanche of asteroid discoveries, Veres explained. In 2005, Congress ordered NASA to build a near-Earth object (NEO) survey program to detect, track, catalogue, and characterize the physical characteristics of all near-Earth asteroids and comets at least 328 feet (100 meters) in diameter. If one of these objects struck our planet, it would cause mass destruction that would decimate life on a continental scale, Payne said. The goal was to find 90% of them by 2020, but current estimates show NASA has only found about 40%, he explained. LSST could help NASA pick up the pace. 'It's just going to start revolutionizing our understanding of this population of things,' Payne said. Binzel agrees. 'Those objects are out there, whether we see them or not,' he said. 'Now we're going to see them, and we'll be able to determine that most—if not all of them—are going to safely pass by the Earth in the coming decades. But the best news is if an object has our name on it already, we will be able to find it most likely many, many years—if not decades—before it would come toward Earth.' In theory, that would give NASA's Planetary Defense Coordination Office (PDOC) time to launch a mission to intercept the asteroid. PDOC is still developing this capability, but in 2022, it launched the Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) mission, which sent a spacecraft on a 10-month-long journey to collide with the asteroid moonlet Dimorphos. The collision successfully changed Dimorphos' orbital path, demonstrating NASA's ability to deflect a large asteroid away from Earth if given enough time. Given Rubin's clear potential to revolutionize planetary defense efforts—and the global attention it has received—one would expect NASA to be singing its praises. That has not been the case. The agency has kept strangely quiet about the observatory's launch—and in fact, it appears to be ignoring Rubin's first discoveries altogether. 'It's a warp drive version of finding asteroids,' Keith Cowing, an astrobiologist and former NASA employee who now serves as editor of NASA Watch, told Gizmodo. 'You'd think that the planetary defense people would be in the front row cheering it on, saying, 'send me the data!'' NASA did not share any public information about Monday's event and has not promoted the observatory's findings. When Gizmodo reached out for comment on Rubin's contributions to planetary science and defense, NASA declined and recommended reaching out to the observatory instead. On Tuesday, June 24, the agency's Office of the Inspector General published a report on the implementation and management of NASA's planetary defense strategy. The report only briefly mentions Rubin alongside NASA's forthcoming NEO Surveyor, a space telescope designed to find asteroids that could hit Earth. 'These new observatories are expected to find and track significantly more NEOs than current capabilities, which will likely mean a substantial increase in necessary follow-up observations,' the report states. NASA's PDCO and its planetary science program will undoubtedly use data gathered by the LSST, so what's with the cold shoulder? Cowing thinks it's a symptom of the agency's inner turmoil. 'They're jittery at NASA,' he said. 'Their budgets are being cut from all sides—they don't know what the final budget will be, but the White House wants to slash it—and they're having to react to this with whatever is at hand.' Indeed, President Donald Trump's 2026 budget proposal would cut NASA's science funding by a whopping 47%, potentially killing more than 40 missions, according to The Planetary Society. 'The only good news is what didn't get shot,' Cowing said. He suspects that most NASA employees—including planetary defense personnel—are in survival mode. 'What do you do when you simply don't know if you'll have a job, if the person next to you will have a job, or if you're gonna need to compete for the same job?' Cowing asked. 'That's what's at the heart of this. It's just this general malaise and fear, and people are simply not doing the routine, professional, collaborative, collegial work that they would do across agencies and countries.' As NASA science crumbles, it's unclear whether the agency will have the resources and personnel to take full advantage of Rubin's data. Though the PDCO currently leads the world's planetary defense efforts, that could soon change. Binzel, however, is optimistic. 'Great nations do great science,' he said. 'I continue to have faith that our nation will continue to do great science.
