WASHINGTON, June 20,
2024 /PRNewswire/ -- For the benefit of all, NASA
released a summary Thursday of the fifth biennial Planetary
Defense Interagency Tabletop Exercise. NASA's Planetary Defense
Coordination Office, in partnership with FEMA (Federal Emergency
Management Agency) and with the assistance of the U.S. Department
of State Office of Space Affairs, convened the tabletop exercise to
inform and assess our ability as a nation to respond effectively to
the threat of a potentially hazardous asteroid or comet.
Although there are no known significant asteroid impact threats
for the foreseeable future, hypothetical exercises provide valuable
insights by exploring the risks, response options, and
opportunities for collaboration posed by varying scenarios, from
minor regional damage with little warning to potential global
catastrophes predicted years or even decades in the future.
"The uncertainties in these initial conditions for the exercise
allowed participants to consider a particularly challenging set of
circumstances," said Lindley
Johnson, planetary defense officer emeritus NASA
Headquarters in Washington. "A
large asteroid impact is potentially the only natural disaster
humanity has the technology to predict years in advance and take
action to prevent."
During the exercise, participants considered potential national
and global responses to a hypothetical scenario in which a
never-before-detected asteroid was identified that had,
according to initial calculations, a 72% chance of hitting
Earth in approximately 14 years. The preliminary observations
described in the exercise, however, were not sufficient to
precisely determine the asteroid's size, composition, and long-term
trajectory. To complicate this year's hypothetical scenario,
essential follow-up observations would have to be delayed for at
least seven months – a critical loss of time – as the asteroid
passed behind the Sun as seen from Earth's vantage point in
space.
Conducting exercises enable government stakeholders to identify
and resolve potential issues as part of preparation for any
real-world situation. It was held in April at the Johns Hopkins
Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) in Laurel, Maryland, and brought together nearly
100 representatives from across U.S. government agencies and, for
the first time, international collaborators on planetary
defense.
"Our mission is helping people before, during, and after
disasters," said Leviticus "L.A." Lewis, FEMA detailee to NASA's
Planetary Defense Coordination Office. "We work across the country
every day before disasters happen to help people and communities
understand and prepare for possible risks. In the event of a
potential asteroid impact, FEMA would be a leading player in
interagency coordination."
This exercise was the first to use data from NASA's DART (Double
Asteroid Redirection Test) mission, the first in-space
demonstration of a technology for defending Earth against potential
asteroid impacts. The DART spacecraft, which impacted the asteroid
moonlet Dimorphos on Sept. 26, 2022,
confirmed a kinetic impactor could change the trajectory of an
asteroid. Applying this or any type of technology to an actual
impact threat would require many years of advance planning.
To help ensure humanity will have the time needed to evaluate
and respond to a potentially hazardous asteroid or comet, NASA
continues the development of its NEO Surveyor (Near-Earth Object
Surveyor), an infrared space telescope designed specifically to
expedite our ability to discover and characterize most of the
potentially hazardous near-Earth objects many years before they
could become an impact threat. The agency's NEO Surveyor's proposed
launch date is set for June 2028.
NASA will publish a complete after-action report for the
tabletop exercise later, which will include strengths and gaps
identified from analysis of the response, other discussions during
the exercise, and recommendations for improvement.
"These outcomes will help to shape future exercises and studies
to ensure NASA and other government agencies continue improving
planetary defense preparedness," said Johnson.
NASA established the Planetary Defense Coordination Office
in 2016 to manage the agency's ongoing planetary-defense efforts.
Johns Hopkins APL managed the DART mission for NASA as a project of
the agency's Planetary Missions Program Office.
To learn more about planetary defense at NASA, visit:
https://science.nasa.gov/planetary-defense/
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SOURCE NASA