NASA has Planned a Mission to Land on metallic asteroid worth $10,000 Quadrillion.
NASA has tracked down a really big rock, that rock is 230 million miles away from the earth. This rock is hovering in the solar system’s asteroid belt and it’s really big in size, but you may be surprised after hearing this the giant metallic rock worth more than the entire global economy.
So NASA decided not only to name this asteroid as psyche 16 but also to visit the asteroid in 2026. after looking at the latest pictures which have been captured by the Hubble Space telescope, group of scientists involve in this project say “this is one of the most unique and valuable object we have ever seen”.
Scientists measured the asteroid and it is 140 miles wide and they say this is one of the largest things in the asteroid belt. This 16 psyche runs between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter. Normally most of the asteroids are made of ice or rock but this one is believed to be almost entirely metallic. Because of its rare properties this might not actually be a regular asteroid at all.
According to the NASA’s planetary Science Journal, the Dr tracy Becker who is the leader of the study mentioned that “We’ve seen meteorites that are mostly metal, but psyche could be unique in that it might be an asteroid that is totally made of iron and nickel it’s possible that as a psyche protoplanet was forming, it was struck by another object in our solar system and lost its mantle and crust”. And further she told that they can not exactly figure how much iron 16 psyche actually contains, but they estimates and suggested it can be worth $10,000 quadrillion. Basically the world economy is wort $149 trillion and this asteroid 16 psyche would worth even more than that.
NASA has been keeping an eye on this 16 psyche for some time now and announced that they will make a mission to the asteroid. So the psyche 16 mission is due to launch on 2022 and is expected to reach the asteroid in 2026. NASA’s Jet Propulsion laboratory is responsible for this mission and it’s operations plus navigations.
Eventually NASA does not have the technology to mine the asteroid yet and has no plans to bring the metals to the earth.
