Hubble image archive
Didymos-Dimorphos System After DART Impact
These three panels capture the breakup of the asteroid Dimorphos when it was deliberately hit by NASA's 1,200-pound Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) mission spacecraft on September 26, 2022. Hubble Space Telescope had a ringside view of the space demolition derby. The top...
- Date
- Jan 1, 2023
- Mission
- Hubble Space Telescope
- Archive ID
- hubblesite-images-2023-006-01gsrbqszcgkjjwa3gwbft6hj2
These three panels capture the breakup of the asteroid Dimorphos when it was deliberately hit by NASA's 1,200-pound Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) mission spacecraft on September 26, 2022. Hubble Space Telescope had a ringside view of the space demolition derby. The top panel, taken 2 hours after impact, shows an ejecta cone of an estimated 1,000 tons of dust.
The center frame shows the dynamic interaction within the asteroid's binary system that starts to distort the cone shape of the ejecta pattern about 17 hours after the impact. The most prominent structures are rotating, pinwheel-shaped features. The pinwheel is tied to the gravitational pull of the companion asteroid, Didymos.
In the bottom frame Hubble next captures the debris being swept back into a comet-like tail by the pressure of sunlight on the tiny dust particles. This stretches out into a debris train where the lightest particles travel the fastest and farthest from the asteroid. The mystery is compounded when Hubble records the tail splitting in two for a few days.
Credits
Science
NASA, ESA, STScI, Jian-Yang Li (PSI)
Image Processing
Joseph DePasquale (STScI)
Image Details
| About The Object | |
|---|---|
| Object Name | Didymos-Dimorphos System |
| Object Description | Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) on asteroid Dimorphos |
| About The Data | |
| Data Description | These images were created from HST data from proposal: (J.-Y. Li). |
| Instrument | WFC3/UVIS |
| Exposure Dates | Sep 27, 28, and Oct 08, 2022 |
| Filters | F350LP |
| About The Image | |
| Color Info | The images are separate exposures acquired by the WFC3 instrument on the Hubble Space Telescope. The color results from assigning a blue hue to a monochromatic (grayscale) image. |
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Source
Image and source material are credited to the official mission archive linked below.
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