Now that the ESA has landed on a comet, NASA wants to do them one better: capture an entire asteroid (or a piece of one) and put it in orbit around the moon in 2019. That's the Asteroid Redirect Mission in a nutshell, and the space agency has now said it will put off which form it will take until next year. Option A involved capturing an entire meteorite about 30 feet across, while option B would see them landing on larger target, Philae-style, and digging out a boulder-sized chunk (see the video below). In both cases, the rock will be towed back to the moon and placed in orbit there. Astronauts launching from the upcoming Space Launch System (SLS) in an Orion capsule will then intercept the orbiting meteorite in 2020, retrieve samples and return to Earth.
That might sound like a classic "what could possibly go wrong?" idea, but the chosen rock would be far too small to hurt the Earth. Rather, the mission would help scientists figure out how to defend our planet from meteorites, while learning more about their composition and preparing for deep space missions -- specifically, the planned mission to Mars. NASA put off the decision because it's still torn about option B. While it's clearly more complex than option A, NASA also feels it could learn a lot more skills that would help on a Mars mission. Either way, the delay in the decision isn't expected to greatly affect the 2019 launch date.
Filed under: Science
Via: Space.com
Source: NASA
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