NASA has given an update on its mission to capture an asteroid worth $10,000 quadrillion.
Last year, the space agency announced that it was going to set off for the faraway asteroid named 16 Psyche, which is thought to contain precious metals, including gold, iron and nickel, worth an eye-watering amount.
“Teams of engineers and technicians are working almost around the clock to ensure the orbiter is ready to journey 2.5 billion miles to a metal-rich asteroid that may tell us more about planetary cores and how planets form,” NASA said in a statement released in July 2023.
The spacecraft was then launched from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida, on October 13, 2023.
The mission began in October. (CHANDAN KHANNA/AFP via Getty Images)
The vessel has been travelling a journey of 2.2 billion miles (3.5 billion km) at a speed of approximately 84,000mph through space and is expected to reach the asteroid in August 2029.
In the latest update, the spacecraft is now in ‘full cruise’ mode and will use what NASA calls its ‘sci-fi-worthy’ thrusters to expel xenon ions.
NASA explains: “For the next year, the spacecraft will be in what mission planners call ‘full cruise’ mode, when its electric thrusters take over and propel the orbiter toward the asteroid belt.
“The thrusters work by expelling charged atoms, or ions, of xenon, emitting a brilliant blue glow that trails behind the spacecraft.”
As the ions are expelled, they will create a thrust that over time will allow the spacecraft to accelerate to up to 124,000mph.
Once it gets to the asteroid, the spacecraft will spend two years orbiting the rocky formation, gathering important data.
After this, the spacecraft is then programmed to approach Mars in May 2026 for a small gravity assist intended to boost its momentum.
This will put the spacecraft in trajectory for its final destination – with the mission planned to reach its conclusion in November 2031.
According to NASA, the asteroid measures a whopping 173 miles (280 km) across and 144 miles (232 km) long, while its surface area is 64,000 square miles (165,800 square km).
And it’s the asteroid’s enormous size that made NASA decide to go ahead with the mission.
Nicola Fox, associate administrator for NASA’s science mission directorate, explained: “Psyche is by far the largest, and that’s why we want to go to it.
A model of the metal-rich asteroid (CHANDAN KHANNA/AFP via Getty Images)
“Because the smaller ones are more likely to have been changed by things impacting them, whereas the big one, we think, is going to be completely unchanged.”
Many have wondered what would happen if NASA was able to bring the asteroid back to Earth.
If it were able to, every person on the planet would essentially be made billionaires.
However, in reality, if scientists went through with this plan, it could crash the world’s economy – kind of like if every living person won the lottery jackpot.
Featured Image Credit: NASA