Speaker
Description
To be able to provide advanced warning of future or imminent impacts of asteroids or comets, the first step is to observe the sky and discover these objects by means of dedicated NEO surveys. Most current and planned NEO surveys are ground-based and carried out in the visible wavelength range. However, this approach has some limitations, such as (1) weather dependency, (2) that only a portion of the night sky is visible from any given location on Earth, (3) NEOs are difficult to detect at low galactic latitudes and (4) that visible-light surveys can only determine the motion and apparent magnitude of an object, but its physical properties (such as size) can only be inferred indirectly and therefore require additional observations for characterisation.
A space-based mission working in the thermal infrared (IR) and placed at the first Sun-Earth Lagrange point (L1) would overcome most of these issues: in fact, by regularly scanning an area not easily accessible from ground or other space-based NEO surveys, it will be capable of detecting and characterising new NEOs and - in the worst case of an imminent impactor - serve as an early warning system.
To fill the above-mentioned gap, ESA is studying a NEO Mission in the Infra-Red, NEOMIR hereafter. NEOMIR’s main objective is to detect objects of at least 35 m (i.e. similar to the Tunguska event) coming from the region inside the Earth’s orbit and with sufficient warning time to prepare appropriate mitigation measures. This is achieved by (1) pointing closer to the Sun and at all Ecliptic latitudes and (2) shortening exposure times and increasing the cadence of revisit, ensuring that faster and therefore closer NEOs are not missed. The thermal infrared data will allow both initial orbit assessment and direct size measurements.
We will present the mission and spacecraft design, the status of the project as well as initial results on expected detection capabilities. We will focus on its ability to detect possible Earth impactors, determine their orbit and impact location.