JPL Preps Special Space Craft to Check Out Near Earth Asteroid

NEA Scout, a spacecraft co-developed at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, will soon be flying close to an asteroid less than 60 feet in size.

The spacecraft will launch sometime after March 1 as one of 10 secondary payloads aboard the powerful Space Launch System (SLS) rocket/ The rocket will take off from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

Developed under NASA’s Advanced Exploration Systems Division, NEA Scout is designed to enhance the agency’s understanding of small NEAs (near earth asteroids). Launching with the Artemis I unmanned test flight, the shoebox-size spacecraft will catch up to the 2020 GE asteroid by unfurling a solar sail to harness solar radiation for propulsion, making this the agency’s first deep space mission of its kind.

2020 GE is a very small asteroid whose orbit crosses the orbit of Earth. The asteroid has been classified as a “Near Earth Asteroid” (NEA) due to its orbit’s proximity to Earth.

Computer simulations have not indicated any imminent likelihood of future collision. The asteroid orbits the sun every 368 days.

In September 2023, the asteroid will make a close approach with Earth, and with a gravitational assist from the Moon, NEA Scout will pick up enough velocity to catch up to the asteroid.

Mission navigators will fine-tune NEA Scout’s trajectory before the spacecraft approaches within a mile of the asteroid.

The spacecraft will collect information about the asteroid, including its size, shape, rotation, and surface properties.

2020 GE was first observed by the University of Arizona’s Catalina Sky Survey as part of its search for near-Earth objects.

“Thanks to the discoveries of NEAs by Earth-based observatories, several targets had been identified for NEA Scout, all within the 16-to-100-foot size range,” Julie Castillo-Rogez, the mission’s principal science investigator at JPL, said. “2020 GE represents a class of asteroid that we currently know very little about.”

“Although large asteroids are of most concern from a planetary defense perspective, objects like 2020 GE are far more common and can pose a hazard to our planet, despite their smaller size,” Castillo-Rogez continued.

On Feb. 15, 2013, a meteor caused by a small asteroid that was the same class as 2020 GE exploded over the city of Chelyabinsk in Russia, creating a shockwave that broke windows all over the city and injured more than 1,600 people.

For more about the NEA Scout mission, visit www.nasa.gov/content/nea-scout.