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SpaceX’s Falcon 9 wins launch of an asteroid-attacking NASA spacecraft

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7 years ago

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Just minutes before SpaceX began fueling Falcon Heavy for its commercial launch debut, NASA announced that the company had won a contract for its Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) mission, to be launched by Falcon 9 for the low cost of $69M.

Designed to cost less than $250M total, the DART mission will aim to be as light and fast as possible, using a dedicated Falcon 9 to send the ~600 kg (~1300 lb) spacecraft and its Italian companion cubesat on an ~11 million kilometer (~7M mi) journey to the binary asteroid Didymos. The ultimate purpose of DART is to effectively prove out both technologies and physics that could be used in the future to defend Earth from asteroids known to be on a collision course.

If all goes as planned during DART’s imminent design review milestones and hardware integration, Falcon 9 could launch the spacecraft towards the Didymos asteroid system in June 2021 for an October 2022 arrival. That “arrival” would involve DART impacting Didymos-B – the smaller of the pair at 163 m (535 ft) across – at a relative velocity of more than 6 km/s (3.7 mi/s). Nicknamed Didymoon, Didymos-B effectively orbits Didymos-A. At that speed, the ~600 kg probe will create an impact with the equivalent explosive force of nearly two and a half tons of TNT, the purpose of which is to determine just how much the sheer kinetic energy of impact can modify a small body’s orbit around the main asteroid.

Estimates from the spacecraft’s mission managers expect Didymoon’s orbit to be shifted by about 1% as measured by the time it takes to orbit Didymos-A, from ~11.9 hours to ~11.8 to 12.0 hours. This is a very small change but one that should – in theory – be easily measurable by telescopes on Earth, despite the fact that Didymoon has been estimated to have a mass of approximately 3.5 million metric tons (7.6 billion pounds), approximately seven million times heavier than DART. In short, NASA is going to functionally bomb an asteroid moon to see if humans might be able to use kinetic impactors to gently ‘boop’ threatening space objects off of the offending trajectory years or even decades in advance.

Despite the inherently destructive, single-use nature that DART’s impactor status bestows, current plans thankfully include an Italian cubesat known as LICIACube. The small copassenger will deploy two days before impact to fully exploit the scientific value of DART’s demise with high-quality photos of the event and aftermath. LICIACube will be traveling the same speed and thus won’t be able to enter orbit around the asteroid system, but a European Space Agency (ESA) mission known as Hera plans to do just that in the mid-2020s to better characterize Didymos and the crater (hopefully) made by DART.

Aside from the mission itself, DART serves as a technology demonstration platform for NASA. It will mark the first in-space use of the NASA-built NEXT-C ion thruster and powerpack, as well as the first standalone use of Roll-Out Solar Array (ROSA) deployment mechanism (shown above being tested on the ISS). Even more intriguing is a proposed transformational solar array planned at one point for DART, a flexible combination of advanced solar cells (~33% efficient) and mirror concentrators that could feed a spacecraft five times as much power for a given solar array area and distance from the sun. It’s unclear whether this will make it into DART’s final design but it still appears to be on the table as of January 2019. According to the contracted manufacturer, DART’s solar array will produce ~6.6 kW, while rough estimates suggest that the solar array will have an area of 16 m^2 (170 ft^2). Relative to the simplicity of the deployment mechanism and small size of DART (~600 kg total), this is an incredible amount of accessible power.

The most recent render of the NASA/APL DART spacecraft. (NASA/APL)
Falcon 9 B1045 rolls out to LC-40 ahead of SpaceX’s first dedicated NASA payload, the TESS exoplanet observatory. (SpaceX)

Getting to orbit

For NASA’s SpaceX launch contract, the agency will pay just $69M, barely 10% above Falcon 9’s bare-minimum list price of $62M. It’s safe to assume that the timing of the contract award – days after SpaceX abruptly dropped an official protest of ULA winning a ~$150M NASA contract – might not be coincidence. Regardless, SpaceX’s decision to bid so low for a NASA launch does lend some serious credence to the company’s protest that ULA’s contract for the mission – NASA’s LUCY asteroid explorer – was “vastly more [expensive]” than the bid SpaceX submitted.

Weighing just ~600 kg (~1300 lb) wet, DART could end up launching with additional copassengers on Falcon 9, although there is a precedent set by NASA’s ~360 kg TESS and Taiwan’s Formosat-5 for SpaceX giving tiny spacecraft dedicated launches. Additionally, it’s possible that DART will launch on a flight-proven Falcon 9 Block 5 rocket, given the likelihood that NASA will have certified flight-proven SpaceX vehicles for almost any launch by 2021.

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Eric Ralph is Teslarati's senior spaceflight reporter and has been covering the industry in some capacity for almost half a decade, largely spurred in 2016 by a trip to Mexico to watch Elon Musk reveal SpaceX's plans for Mars in person. Aside from spreading interest and excitement about spaceflight far and wide, his primary goal is to cover humanity's ongoing efforts to expand beyond Earth to the Moon, Mars, and elsewhere.

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Investor's Corner

Lucid denies rumors of bankruptcy after over 40% stock drop

Published

3 hours ago

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July 14, 2026

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Credit: Lucid

Electric vehicle maker Lucid Group has denied rumors of an imminent bankruptcy after a report from this morning sent the stock on a dramatic drop on Wall Street, seeing losses of more than 40 percent during trading hours.

Lucid’s Director of Communications, Nick Twork, responded to the report from Eletric-Vehicles.com, which stated the company’s restructuring advisor, AlixPartners, was asked to review two decisions: taking Lucid shares private or filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection.

The report also claims AlixPartners told the Lucid board to “concentrate on Gravity production while improving its quality, and to temporarily hold back the Lucid Air, the sedan that has defined the company since its launch.”

Twork said:

Shares rebounded after the response to the report, halving its losses as the trading day neared 3 p.m. Eastern.

Lucid has struggled to get its sales off the ground and into more respectable numbers, but the company is in its early years, when things are hard to begin with. It is also backed by several notable investors, including the Saudi Public Investment Fund (PIF), which has nearly limitless money and likely would not ditch an investment of this size so soon.

Lucid shares were down just 14 percent at the time of publication, a far cry from the 55 percent its losses topped out at during the day.

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Tesla owner attempts resale of Model S Signature Edition for over $260k

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7 hours ago

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July 14, 2026

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Credit: Tesla

A Tesla owner who purchased a Model S Signature Edition, one of the final 250 units of the all-electric flagship vehicle that the company discontinued earlier this year, is attempting to sell the car despite a no-resale clause that prohibits reselling for the first year.

The car is being sold by J&S Autohaus in Ewing, New Jersey, and is priced at $260,490, well above the $159,420 that Tesla sold it for earlier this year.

To those who do not know, the Model S Signature was a highly exclusive, limited-run farewell variant of the Model S Plaid that was produced this year to mark the end of production of both the Model S and Model X, Tesla’s two flagship vehicles.

Limited to just 250 units with invite-only sales, it serves as a collector’s item celebrating the legacy of the Model S, which helped pioneer Tesla’s electric vehicle success since its 2012 launch.

It bundles top-tier performance with bespoke cosmetic and luxury upgrades, plus Tesla’s Luxe Package. Here’s what the Model S Signature has over the typical Model S Plaid:

  • Exclusive Exterior – Unique Garnet Red Paint, matching door handles, gold Tesla “T” badges upfront, gold Plaid and Signature badging at the rear.
  • Premium Interior – White Alcantara upholstery with gold piping/accents, gold Plaid seat badges, Signature-marked door sills, individually numbered dashboard plaque, gold puddle lights, special interior lighting sequence, and a custom Signature key fob.
  • Performance Upgrades – Carbon-ceramic brakes with gold calipers
  • Bundled Luxe Package – Full Self-Driving (Supervised), four years of Premium Connectivity, free lifetime Supercharging
  • Performance Metrics – ~1,020 horsepower, sub-2-second 0-60 MPH, ~390-mile range

Tesla quickly introduced a No Resale Agreement for the Signature Editions of the Model S and Model X, which would penalize the seller for “the amount of $50,000 or the value received as consideration for the sale or transfer, whichever is greater.”

The company continues:

“If you sell or otherwise transfer the ownership of your Model S or Model X, the remainder of the Recommended Maintenance, Wheel and Tire Protection Plan, and Windshield Protection Plan will transfer automatically to the buyer. The Full Self-Driving (Supervised), Free Supercharging and Premium Connectivity will not transfer with the vehicle and will terminate once the ownership of the Model S or Model X is transferred.”

Tesla will likely come after the seller, especially as it has been about two months since Tesla launched deliveries.

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Tesla Full Self-Driving v14.3.5 Early Impressions: new features and early performance

Published

10 hours ago

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July 14, 2026

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Credit: TESLARATI

Tesla rolled out Full Self-Driving (Supervised) v14.3.5 yesterday, and about fifty miles of driving on the new version has given me enough time to highlight what seems to be strong about the release and what is not.

Additionally, Tesla has added a few new features with this specific update, which we’ll highlight as well.

Tesla Full Self-Driving v14.3.5 Performance

The new update is business as usual. Things seem to be running completely normal and necessary, but there are a few things that we’ve seemed to pick up on based on our own experience with v14.3.5, as well as what other users are seeing.

Initially, it seems to be more aware of its surroundings, making moves that are incredibly courteous to other drives and operating just a tad more reserved than what the suite might have done previously.

We had two instances where it showed this, the first being FSD needing to pass a Flagger Force vehicle that was placing down signage for the day. Their work truck was right at the front corner of a right-hand turn; typically where most cars travel when they take that turn.

FSD v14.3.5 recognized this, slowed down, and took the turn wide with no issues:

Additionally, v14.3.5 backed up for a semi truck that was making a wide turn onto a road my car was on. This is not new, but it seemed to be backing up for courtesy; it didn’t seem completely necessary, but it might have put some peace of mind in the truck driver’s head:

X user Mike P, also a Pennsylvania native like myself, shared three clips of his Tesla running v14.3.5 performing similar maneuvers. He said:

“FSD turns right into a small alley that only fits one car at a time, sees oncoming car, reverses out of alley to make space, realizes oncoming car is actually parking, re-enters alley.”
Check it out here:

It seems like Speed Profiles are still in need of some tweaking; I am adjusting what Speed Profile I’m in frequently, constantly changing it to get it to travel at the correct speed. This was an issue for me on v14.3.4. It seems like they’re just a little inconsistent.

Terrible Parking

Parking attempts on v14.3.5 were not good. There are quite a few people who have said this:

David Moss, the Tesla owner who has taken multiple coast-to-coast drives without any interventions, also has had some issues with parking early on with v14.3.5:

New Features

Tesla has added the ability to open Camera Preview at any time. Previously, it was only available in Park. Here’s what that feature looks like in action:

Check back later this week for a longer review of what we’ve noticed on Full Self-Driving v14.3.5.

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