The probe should hit Dimorphos at 22,000 kilometers per hour. Its purpose is not to blow up the entire moon, but to push it out of orbit. This is expected to happen on Monday at around 1.15pm (Netherlands time).

The impact is likely to change the moon’s orbital period, which is usually 11 hours and 45 minutes, by 10 minutes. In cosmological terms, this is only a small push. But a slight change in course could cause a future asteroid to pass Earth on a collision course.

NASA has never tried anything like this before. By the way, the test is not a threat to Earth. The space agency said earlier that “the system is an ideal place to test whether it is possible to alter the course of an asteroid by deliberately colliding with a spacecraft in it.”

NASA asserts that at the moment, there is absolutely no threat to Earth. Billions of asteroids and comets revolve around the sun. Tens of thousands of them could one day pose a threat to Earth, but they won’t come close to us for at least the next 100 years.