NASA's Hubble Captures Twin Tails Of Dust From Asteroid After DART Crash

NASA's Hubble Space Telescope spotted twin tails of dust ejecting from the Didymos-Dimorphos asteroid system. Last month, NASA DART spacecraft slammed itself into a distant asteroid in a test of the world's first planetary defence system, designed to prevent a potential doomsday meteorite collision with Earth. Hubble captured the aftermath of the impact.

The data from the crash shows that DART shortened Dimorphos' original 11-hour and 55-minute orbit around Didymos by about 32 minutes. The mission was devised to determine whether a spacecraft is capable of changing the trajectory of an asteroid through sheer kinetic force, nudging it off course just enough to keep our planet out of harm's way.

According to NASA's press release, the repeated observations from Hubble over the last few weeks have allowed scientists to present a more complete picture of how the system's debris cloud has evolved over time. The observations show that the ejected material, or "ejecta," has expanded and faded in brightness as time went on after impact, largely as expected. The twin tail is an unexpected development, although similar behaviour is commonly seen in comets and active asteroids. The Hubble observations provide the best-quality image of the double-tail to date.

So far, Hubble has made 18 observations of the system. The image indicates the second tail formed between October 2 and October 8.

"The relationship between the comet-like tail and other ejecta features seen at various times in images from Hubble and other telescopes is still unclear and is something the Investigation Team is currently working to understand. The northern tail is newly developed. In the coming months, scientists will be taking a closer look at the data from Hubble to determine how the second tail developed. There are a number of possible scenarios the team will investigate," the release said.