Study on Strategy and Efficiency of Dynamic Push Away from Orbit for Near-Earth Asteroids

Abstract

In view of the threat of more frequent near-Earth asteroid impacts，the asteroid dynamic push away deflection disposal mission was demonstrated. The disposal method was pushed away the asteroid multiple times by penetrating and anchoring the asteroid surface and by electric propulsion. In this paper，a dynamic model of near-Earth asteroids was established to study the change of orbit deviation of asteroids with different rotation states under the dynamic push away treatment strategy. Taking the deflection of 2019VL5 asteroid as an example，the efficiency of dynamic push away disposal and the feasibility of the project were evaluated by numerical simulation. The simulation results show that during the warning time of 4 years the maximum deflection distance of the asteroid could be 2.91 × 10⁴ km under the small 0.4 N thrust applied to the specific orbital position，and the maximum deflection distance of the asteroid could be 9.0 × 10⁴ km after 2 500 days of disposal. The dynamic push away disposal of asteroids can effectively deflect threatening asteroids，and can be used in future asteroids deflecting defense missions and orbit transfer missions against other space object attacks.

Keywords

near-Earth asteroids / planetary defense / dynamic push away / deflection disposal