July 19, 2024
Armada to Apophis "It will miss the Earth. It will miss the
For nearly 20 years, scientists have known an asteroid named Apophis will pass unusually close to Earth on Friday, April 13, 2029. But most officials at the world's space agencies stopped paying much attention when updated measurements ruled out the chance Apophis will impact Earth anytime soon.
Now, Apophis is again on the agenda, but this time as a science opportunity, not as a threat. The problem is there's not much time to design, build and launch a spacecraft to get into position near Apophis in less than five years. The good news is there are designs, and in some cases, existing spacecraft, that governments can repurpose for missions to Apophis, a rocky asteroid about the size of three football fields. "The three most important things about Apophis are: It will miss the Earth. It will miss the Earth. It will miss the Earth," said Richard Binzel, a professor of planetary science at MIT. Binzel has co-chaired several conferences since 2020 aimed at drumming up support for space missions to take advantage of the Apophis opportunity in 2029. Photo credit: This artist's concept shows the possible appearance of ESA's RAMSES spacecraft, which will release two small CubeSats for additional observations at Apophis.https://arstechnica.com/space/2024/07/https://arstechnica.com/space/2024/07/
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