Asteroid impact avoidance

Asteroid deflection

Asteroid impact avoidance is a method to destroy near-Earth objects (NEO) which are on a potential collision course with Earth. This method includes launching a rocket, satellite or other foreign object into an NEO to prevent it from crashing into Earth.^[1]^[2]

Ongoing projects

Sentinel mission

The B612 Foundation is a private nonprofit foundation dedicated to protecting the Earth from asteroid attacks.

Asteroid Impact Avoidance Media

Kinetic impactors such as the one used by the Double Asteroid Redirection Test – its impact with the asteroid moon Dimorphos photographed above – are one of many methods designed to alter the trajectory of an asteroid to prevent its potential collision with Earth.
Frequency of small asteroids roughly 1 to 20 meters in diameter impacting Earth's atmosphere.
Number of NEOs detected by various projects.
NEOWISE – first four years of data starting in December 2013 (animated; April 20, 2018)
Why asteroid impact probability often goes up, then down.
In a similar manner to the earlier pipes filled with a partial pressure of helium, as used in the Ivy Mike test of 1952, the 1954 Castle Bravo test was likewise heavily instrumented with line-of-sight (LOS) pipes, to better define and quantify the timing and energies of the x-rays and neutrons produced by these early thermonuclear devices. One of the outcomes of this diagnostic work resulted in this graphic depiction of the transport of energetic x-ray and neutrons through a vacuum line, some 2.3 km long, whereupon it heated solid matter at the "station 1200" blockhouse and thus generated a secondary fireball.
This early Asteroid Redirect Mission artist's impression is suggestive of another method of changing a large threatening celestial body's orbit by capturing relatively smaller celestial objects and using those, and not the usually proposed small bits of spacecraft, as the means of creating a powerful kinetic impact, or alternatively, a stronger faster acting gravitational tractor, as some low-density asteroids such as 253 Mathilde can dissipate impact energy.
"Who knows whether, when a comet shall approach this globe to destroy it ... men will not tear rocks from their foundations by means of steam, and hurl mountains, as the giants are said to have done, against the flaming mass?"— Lord Byron
The 2005 Deep Impact collision with the eight-by-five-kilometer (5 by 3 mi) comet Tempel 1. The impact flash and resulting ejecta are clearly visible.
Compiled timelapse of DART's final 5.5 minutes until impact