A NASA spacecraft successfully slammed into an asteroid on Monday evening, testing technology that could be used in the future to protect Earth.
The Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) spacecraft hit the asteroid at 14,000 miles per hour, in a test to see if DART could knock it off its path. NASA is looking for ways to defend the planet from asteroids and smaller objects hurtling through space, which are "far more numerous, and although they would not set off mass extinctions, they can unleash more energy than a nuclear bomb," The New York Times writes.
Subscribe to The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
-
Today's political cartoons - December 21, 2024Cartoons Saturday's cartoons - losing it, pedal to the metal, and more
-
Three fun, festive activities to make the magic happen this Christmas DayInspire your children to help set the table, stage a pantomime and write thank-you letters this Christmas!
-
The best books of 2024 to give this ChristmasThe Week Recommends From Percival Everett to Rachel Clarke these are the critics' favourite books from 2024
-
US won its war on 'murder hornets,' officials saySpeed Read The announcement comes five years after the hornets were first spotted in the US
-
Earth's magnetic North Pole is shifting toward RussiaUnder the radar The pole is on the move
-
Indian space mission's moment in the SunUnder the Radar Emerging space power's first solar mission could help keep Earth safe from Sun's 'fireballs'
-
Dark energy data suggest Einstein was rightSpeed Read Albert Einstein's 1915 theory of general relativity has been proven correct, according to data collected by the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument
-
Mars may have been habitable more recently than thoughtUnder the Radar A lot can happen in 200 million years
-
New DNA tests of Pompeii dead upend popular storiesSpeed Read An analysis of skeletal remains reveals that some Mount Vesuvius victims have been wrongly identified
-
A giant meteor did double duty on Earth billions of years agoUnder the Radar Nutrients from the impact led to a "fertilizer bomb"
-
NASA's Europa Clipper blasts off, seeking an oceanSpeed Read The ship is headed toward Jupiter on a yearslong journey
