Back in April of this year, China announced that it was working on a system to protect the Earth from asteroids, it will include systems for monitoring and directly neutralizing objects that potentially threaten the Earth. And now it has become known that the first mission to deflect the trajectory of an asteroid is scheduled for 2026. The corresponding object has already been selected.

The details of this mission were outlined by Long Lehao, chief designer of China's Long March rocket series, in a lecture titled "Science and Innovation in China."

According to his presentation, the object 2020 PN1 was chosen as the target for testing. The launch will be carried out using the Long March 3B rocket, China's sort of orbital workhorse. With its help, China launches satellites into geostationary orbit, but the Long March-3B was also used in lunar missions.

The mission to deflect the asteroid's trajectory will include both an impactor and an observer orbital vehicle. The first will collide with an asteroid, while the second will observe this event. The diameter of the asteroid 2020 PN1 reaches about 40 meters. At the moment, it does not threaten the Earth, but Chinese scientists want to test the technology on it.

bbabo.Net