Asteroid Day: Bennu and OSIRIS-REx

On June 30, 1908, a tremendous explosion rocked the Tunguska region of Siberia, Russia, leveling 80 million trees and killing numerous reindeer. As the region was sparsely populated with humans, only a handful of witness accounts were collected, reporting the appearance of a fireball that crossed the sky prior to the explosion. In the decades since, scientists have concluded the Tunguska Event was an impact event, despite the absence of a crater. Luckily, the human consequences for this event were small, but how can we understand what happened, how it happened, and prevent it from happening someplace more populated? 

Asteroid Day marks the Tunguska Event every year on June 30, led by Queen guitarist and astrophysicist Brian May, former astronaut Rusty Schweickart, filmmaker Grig Richters, and B612 Foundation President Danica Remy. The mission seeks to not just raise awareness of the threat to our planet but push for more understanding of asteroids and their place in the history of our solar system. 

OSIRIS-REx also seeks answers to the questions that are central to the human experience: Where did we come from? What is our destiny? Asteroids, the leftover debris from the solar system formation process, can answer these questions and teach us about the history of the sun and planets. Recently, the spacecraft traveled to the asteroid Bennu and collected a sample from its surface in October 2020. Now the craft is on its way back to Earth with that sample and expected to arrive in September 2023. Joining us today to observe the occasion of Asteroid Day and talk about all things asteroid is the Principal Investigator for the OSIRIS-REx mission, Dante Lauretta.

Learn more: https://www.asteroidmission.org/

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