Topic summary
Asteroid deflection
Extracted from the Wikipedia article Asteroid impact avoidance.
Chinese asteroid deflection mission
China's CNSA intended to launch a deflection mission to near-Earth object 2019 VL5, a 30-meter wide asteroid, by 2025. In 2024 it was announced that the target asteroid had been changed to 2015 XF261 instead, with the launch taking place in 2027 and the arrival of the spacecraft at the asteroid in 2029. The mission will launch on a Long March 3B rocket and carry both an impactor and observer spacecraft.