On September 26, 2022, a NASA spacecraft ran into the asteroid Dimorphos at nearly 15,000 miles per hour. Far from being a multi-million-dollar boondoggle, this collision is precisely what astronomers had planned. The spacecraft was part of the Double Asteroid Redirection Test mission, or DART for short. The goal: to test technology that could potentially divert a large asteroid, should we ever locate one on a collision course with Earth.
Maybe you’ve noticed the bright red “star” hovering high in the southern sky thiswinter. Maybe you’ve noticed it shining with a seemingly steadier light than otherstars in the night sky. Maybe you’ve even noticed it changing position relative tothe constellations. These observations reveal that this object is not a star, butrather the fourth planet from the Sun: Mars.
Maybe you’ve noticed the bright red “star” hovering high in the southern sky thiswinter. Maybe you’ve noticed it shining with a seemingly steadier light than otherstars in the night sky. Maybe you’ve even noticed it changing position relative tothe constellations. These observations reveal that this object is not a star, butrather the fourth planet from the Sun: Mars.