[FPSPACE] Canadian satellite to detect Earth hits

[LARRY KLAES]

Canadian satellite to detect Earth hits

http://www.spacedaily.com/reports/Canadian_satellite_to_detect_Earth_hits_999.html

by Staff Writers

Ottawa (UPI) May 2, 2008

Canadian researchers are working on a tiny satellite that will alert the 
world to the potential of asteroid strikes.

"This is the first space-based asteroid-searching telescope," said Alan 
Hildebrand of the University of Calgary (Alberta), one of two principal 
scientists for the satellite.

He told the Canwest News Service the Near Earth Object Surveillance 
Satellite, set to be launched within two years is "the first space-based 
asteroid-searching telescope."

Once completed, the NEOSSat device will weigh only 135 pounds, and will be 
the size of a small suitcase, the report said.

"I think the most exciting thing about this mission is we are going to find 
asteroids that are accessible from our planet," Hildebrand said.

He said the mini-satellite would also help define celestial origins.

"We've been to the moon. There's always more you can do (there), but 
asteroids have so much more to teach us about the origins of the solar 
system," Hildebrand told the news agency.