The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) and the Hubble Space Telescope have captured the moment the $330m Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) craft hit a small asteroid.
At 7:14 p.m. EDT on Monday, DART impacted the asteroid Dimorphos, which together with another larger body — Didymos — forms a binary, near-Earth asteroid system. The aim of the DART mission is to be the first to demonstrate “kinetic impact” by putting Dimorphos in a slightly different orbit around Didymos.
The JWST observed the impact over five hours, capturing 10 images while Hubble took over 40 pictures before and after the impact. The image of the impact shows a tight, compact core with plumes of material appearing as wisps streaming away from the centre of where the impact took place.
In the Hubble images, astronomers estimate that the brightness of Dimorphos increased three times after impact and they also found, surprisingly, that the brightness held steady for some eight hours after impact.
DART mission successfully hits asteroid in first-of-its-kind test
Hubble and the JWST will now continue to observe the system over the coming weeks. Such observations by space-based telescopes as well as ground-based instruments will allow scientists to study the surface of Dimorphos, how much material was ejected by the collision, how fast it was ejected and reveal the distribution of particle sizes in the expanding dust cloud.
This information can then be used to understand how effectively a kinetic impact can modify an asteroid’s orbit.