The best thing the public can do is advocate for increased funding to accelerate asteroid discovery rates. Bennu will not hit Earth. At least not for hundreds of years, say scientists. But the slight odds of it happening have increased by a tiny percentage, thanks to...
A recent AP-NORC poll found two-thirds of Americans wanted the US space program to prioritize monitoring asteroids. The poll asked 1,137 American adults “How important is it for the United States space program to do each of the following?” and the top response was “Monitor asteroids,...
If you read internet news, you may have seen headlines that say “KILLER ASTEROID ON COLLISION COURSE WITH EARTH” or “COULD ASTEROID X HIT EARTH NEXT WEEK?.” Too many sites earn their clicks with fake and fearful headlines about asteroids. We try to explain that this...
Members of the B612 community flew to San Diego from all over the country to celebrate the 50th anniversary of B612 co-founder Rusty Schweickart’s flight on Apollo 9. The Air and Space Museum of San Diego, home to the Apollo 9 Command Module, hosted the mission’s...
Popular Science interviewed B612 co-founder Ed Lu about the meteor that recently exploded over the Bering Sea. The meteor exploded more than 10 miles above the surface of the Earth over an unpopulated region, but Ed noted that is served as a solid reminder that “the...
Asteroid Institute Mission Director Harold Reitsema recently presented at the National Academies of Science on the work that B612 has done on space-based asteroid observation missions. The National Academies of Sciences has been tasked to explore the capabilities of space-based telescopes, including exploring the relative advantages...
Over the past decade, B612, and now the Asteroid Institute, have argued for the importance of finding and tracking Near Earth Asteroids. Consistent with the Asteroid Day 100X Declaration, we have supported efforts to increase the rate of discovery and tracking of asteroids, from LSST to...
Last month, NASA’s Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) moved into the final design and assembly phase. The DART mission will send a spacecraft to crash into the secondary body of the binary asteroid 65803 Didymos in order to demonstrate the kinetic impact technique needed to...
NASA recently announced it is supporting the building of two additional ATLAS (Asteroid Terrestrial-impact Last Alert System) telescopes to be built in the Southern hemisphere. This is good news as it will fill in the gaps since there are regions in the southern sky currently not...
ESA and NASA are currently reviewing the Hera Mission with plans to demonstrate that an asteroid can be shifted in its orbit by 2022. This is a great mission for ESA and NASA, and we look forward to cheering both agencies efforts during the course of...