Spacecraft heads off on 6.8m-mile journey to crash into moonlet Dimorphos in world-first test to see if asteroids can be diverted from collision with Earth
A spacecraft that must ultimately crash in order to succeed lifted off late on Tuesday from California on a Nasa mission to demonstrate the world’s first planetary defence system.
Carried aboard a SpaceX-owned Falcon 9 rocket, the Dart (Double Asteroid Redirection Test) spacecraft soared into the sky at 10.21pm Pacific time from the Vandenberg US Space Force Base, about 150 miles (240km) north-west of Los Angeles.
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