S8 Ep636: 13. The Success of NASA’s DART Mission Guest: Rahil Makadia Rahil Makadia explains the success of NASA’s DART mission, which impacted the asteroid Dimorphos to test planetary defense. This kinetic impact altered the asteroid's orbit by 30 minutes. Makadia
The John Batchelor Show
John Batchelor
4.5 • 2.8K Ratings
🗓️ 25 March 2026
⏱️ 13 minutes
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Summary
13. The Success of NASA’s DART Mission Guest: Rahil Makadia Rahil Makadia explains the success of NASA’s DART mission, which impacted the asteroid Dimorphos to test planetary defense. This kinetic impact altered the asteroid's orbit by 30 minutes. Makadia notes that most asteroids are "rubble piles," and the impact's effectiveness is boosted by material kicked off the surface. (13)
MAY 1953
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| 0:00.0 | I'm John Batchel. This is Hotel Mars Episode N, my colleague and co-host, David Livingston, Dr. Space, himself, |
| 0:22.6 | of the space show joins me, and we're headed to planetary defense, thanks to Rahil Makadilla, |
| 0:29.4 | who is going to help us understand the success of a mission launched in 2021, making contact with a |
| 0:36.4 | binary asteroid in 2022. |
| 0:39.2 | The contact led to violence, and the violence led to revelations of planetary defense. |
| 0:45.3 | All those dots, Rahil is here to connect for us. |
| 0:48.8 | Rahil, a very good day to you. |
| 0:51.1 | Thank you for this. |
| 0:52.0 | Dart is a successful mission. |
| 0:55.5 | The idea here, |
| 1:02.8 | however, requires some attention to physics, to asteroids, to the ability to discern what you've achieved in slamming into an asteroid, and the results that lead to better understanding |
| 1:09.9 | of planetary defense. |
| 1:11.8 | A very good day to you. |
| 1:13.2 | What was, what is the remaining mission? |
| 1:16.9 | What did you seek to understand about this binary asteroid? |
| 1:21.2 | Thank you. |
| 1:22.7 | Sure, absolutely. |
| 1:23.8 | Thanks for having me, first of all. |
| 1:25.2 | And yeah, DART or the double asteroid redirection test, |
| 1:29.5 | was a spacecraft that NASA launched, like you mentioned, in November of 2021. |
| 1:34.6 | And in September of 2022, the spacecraft intentionally impacted an asteroid called demorphos, |
| 1:41.3 | which belongs to a binary asteroid system, which you also mentioned, called |
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