China’s program to protect the earth from asteroids involves the joint launch of two probes: one to monitor, the other to hit.
The universe gives us wonders … but also some threats. Like that represented by asteroids close to the earth, whose impact with our planet – albeit unlikely – can have devastating consequences. China has just proposed international research to protect us from this danger.
The impact technique. During the third international conference on the exploration of the deep space held last week in Hefei, Wu Weiren – the mind behind the Chinese lunar program – presented a strategy to protect our planet.
The project provides for monitoring and early alert: an integrated space-termination system, capable of promptly detecting the neo (Near-Earth Objects) and precisely notifying their position. Then give life to a “Fly-Along-Impact-Fly-Along” mission (fly, hit, fly), which involves the joint launch of two probes-one that observes and one that impacts. After a close observation, a spacecraft will affect the high -speed asteroid, diverting the orbit, while the observer will follow and record the result. The goal is to remove the asteroid from the earth for decades, perhaps even for a century.
But China doesn’t stop there. At the beginning of 2025, he started a plan to hire planetary defense experts, to be occupied in monitoring and alert activities, with a particular eye to the Asteroid 2024 YR4, initially considered at risk for 2032. The new observations, however, drastically resized the threat: today the probability of impact has been reduced to values close to zero according to ESA and NASA, while the chances of the moon can increase.
The strategy includes a multidirectional space network for monitoring, technological quick reaction packages to face any type of potential threat. Furthermore, China invites to cooperate internationally on observation, instrumental development, shared data and research.
And Europe? On the European front, international cooperation is now consolidated, thanks above all to the Aida mission: a strategic demonstration of asteroidal deflection with kinetic impact. NASA had inaugurated the method with the Dart mission in 2022, impacting drevorphos – a small “moon” of the Asteroid Didymos – and modifying its orbit. A historical success for the planetary defense.
ESA, with the Hera mission, launched in October 2024 on a Falcon 9, will resume contact with Dimorphos to examine the effect of the impact with scientific detail.
In the meantime, Ramses is coming, a joint ESA – Jaxa mission that should start between 2028 and 2029 to reach the Asteroid Apophis, study their properties and test the defense technologies in case of its close passage to the earth.
In the past, the EU had developed the Neoshield-2 project as part of the Horizon 2020 program, with the aim of creating technologies and strategies to deviate asteroids and study its surfaces.
The United States. The NASA, in addition to the Dart mission, on a government level, has carried out a recent simulation of “apocalyptic scenario”, planning the response to an asteroid with 72 % impact probability in 14 years: the exercise showed gaps in the preparation for such an emergency, underlining the importance of a solid operational plan.
On a scientific and academic level, the idea of a rapid flyby mission is in development, designed to respond in a few days to identify an asteroid that risks impacting, collecting fundamental data to guide defense decisions.
