NASA department for avoiding asteroid impacts
Planetary Defense Coordination Office
![](//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/8/83/Planetary_Defense_Coordination_Office_seal.png/220px-Planetary_Defense_Coordination_Office_seal.png) |
|
Formed
| January 2016
(
2016-01
)
|
---|
Jurisdiction
| United States
|
---|
Headquarters
| Washington, D.C.
|
---|
Motto
| Hic Servare Diem
(
Latin
)
"Here to Save the Day"
[1]
|
---|
Agency executive
| - Lindley Johnson
[2]
, Planetary Defense Officer
|
---|
Parent department
| Science Mission Directorate, Planetary Science Division
|
---|
Parent agency
| NASA
|
---|
Website
| nasa
.gov
/planetarydefense
|
---|
The
Planetary Defense Coordination Office
(
PDCO
) is a
planetary defense
organization established in January 2016 within
NASA
's Planetary Science Division of the Science Mission Directorate.
[3]
Its mission is to look for and catalogue
near-Earth objects
such as
comets
,
asteroids
, and
potentially hazardous objects
that could impact Earth, as well as help the U.S. government prepare for a potential
impact event
(and coordinate efforts to mitigate and deflect potential threats if one is detected).
[4]
History
[
edit
]
In 2005, the
U.S. Congress
passed the
NASA Authorization Act
, which, in part, tasked NASA with finding and cataloguing at least 90% of all
near-Earth objects
that are 140 meters or larger by 2020.
[5]
[6]
However, that goal was clearly not being met by NASA's Near Earth Object Observations Program, which a 2014 report by the
NASA Office of Inspector General
pointed out.
[7]
In June 2015,
NASA
and
National Nuclear Security Administration
of the
U.S. Department of Energy
, which had been studying impact events on their own, signed an agreement to work in cooperation.
[8]
In January 2016, NASA officially announced the establishment of the Planetary Defense Coordination Office (PDCO), appointing Lindley Johnson to lead it as Planetary Defense Officer.
[4]
[2]
[9]
The PDCO was given the job of cataloging and tracking potentially hazardous
near-Earth objects
(NEO), such as
asteroids
and
comets
, larger than 30?50 meters in diameter (compare to the 20-meter
Chelyabinsk meteor
that exploded over Russia in 2013) and coordinating an effective threat response and mitigation effort.
[10]
[11]
It has been a part of several key NASA missions, including
OSIRIS-REx
,
[12]
NEOWISE
, and
Double Asteroid Redirection Test
(DART). For NEOWISE, NASA worked with the
Jet Propulsion Laboratory
, to investigate various impact-threat scenarios in order to learn the best approach to the threat of an incoming impactor. The office will continue to use the
polar orbiting
infrared telescope
NEOWISE
to detect any
potentially hazardous objects
.
[13]
Double Asteroid Redirection Test
(DART), a joint project between NASA and the
Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory
, is the first planetary defense mission of NASA.
[14]
In November 2021, the DART spacecraft was launched with the goal of seeing if it could "alter an
asteroid
's path, a technique that may be used to defend the planet in the future".
[5]
The attempt was successful.
In popular culture
[
edit
]
The 2021 movie
Don't Look Up
is about a "planet killer"
comet
, in which the Planetary Defense Officer is played by
Rob Morgan
.
[15]
The PDCO chief Lindley Johnson vetted an early draft of the
screenplay
over two years before the film's 2021 release.
[16]
See also
[
edit
]
References
[
edit
]
- ^
"How a real NASA patch anchors Netflix's 'Don't Look Up' in reality"
.
collectSPACE.com
.
Archived
from the original on January 28, 2022
. Retrieved
January 15,
2022
.
- ^
a
b
"PDCO Organization"
.
NASA
. NASA.
Archived
from the original on November 28, 2021
. Retrieved
December 25,
2021
.
- ^
Sarkar, Monica (January 13, 2016).
"NASA Planetary Defense Office set up to save Earth"
.
CNN
.
Archived
from the original on December 25, 2021
. Retrieved
December 25,
2021
.
- ^
a
b
David, Leonard (January 11, 2016).
"NASA creates office to coordinate protection against asteroids"
.
Christian Science Monitor
.
Archived
from the original on January 12, 2016
. Retrieved
January 12,
2016
.
- ^
a
b
Roulette, Joey (November 24, 2021).
"NASA Launches New Mission: Crash Into Asteroid, Defend Planet Earth"
.
The New York Times
.
Archived
from the original on June 10, 2022
. Retrieved
December 25,
2021
.
- ^
Jonah Engel Bromwich (April 19, 2017).
"Asteroid Misses Earth Narrowly, by Cosmic Standards"
.
The New York Times
.
Archived
from the original on December 25, 2021
. Retrieved
December 25,
2021
.
- ^
Martin, Paul K. (September 15, 2014).
NASA’s Efforts to Identify Near-Earth Objects and Mitigate Hazards
(PDF)
. NASA Office of Inspector General.
Archived
(PDF)
from the original on December 22, 2021
. Retrieved
December 25,
2021
.
- ^
Broad, William J. (June 18, 2015).
"Agencies, Hoping to Deflect Comets and Asteroids, Step Up Earth Defense"
.
The New York Times
.
Archived
from the original on December 25, 2021
. Retrieved
December 25,
2021
.
- ^
David, Leonard (January 5, 2021).
"Defending Earth against dangerous asteroids: Q&A with NASA's Lindley Johnson"
.
Space.com
.
Archived
from the original on October 5, 2021
. Retrieved
October 5,
2021
.
- ^
"Planetary Defense Coordination Office"
.
NASA
. December 22, 2015.
Archived
from the original on July 28, 2022
. Retrieved
January 14,
2016
.
This article incorporates text from this source, which is in the
public domain
.
- ^
Templeton, Graham (January 12, 2016).
"NASA is opening a new office for planetary defense"
.
ExtremeTech
.
Archived
from the original on July 6, 2017
. Retrieved
January 14,
2016
.
- ^
"OSIRIS-REx"
.
NASA
. April 14, 2021.
Archived
from the original on July 15, 2022
. Retrieved
December 25,
2021
.
- ^
Laguipo, Angela (January 16, 2016).
"This Is How NASA's Planetary Defense Office Will Protect Planet Earth From Asteroid Collisions"
.
Tech Times
.
Archived
from the original on February 2, 2016
. Retrieved
January 18,
2016
.
- ^
"Double Asteroid Redirection Test"
.
Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory
.
Archived
from the original on February 18, 2021
. Retrieved
February 18,
2021
.
This article incorporates text from this source, which is in the
public domain
.
- ^
Tyler Austin Harper (December 22, 2021).
"Silicon Valley Won't Save Us"
.
Slate
.
Archived
from the original on December 25, 2021
. Retrieved
December 25,
2021
.
- ^
Kluger, Jeffrey (December 21, 2021).
"Breaking Down the Mostly Real Science Behind Don't Look Up"
.
Time
.
Archived
from the original on December 25, 2021
. Retrieved
December 25,
2021
.
External links
[
edit
]
|
---|
Main topics
| |
---|
Defense
| |
---|
Space probes
| |
---|
NEO
tracking
| |
---|
Organizations
| |
---|
Potential threats
| |
---|
Related categories
| |
---|