NASA has announced plans to visit a vast asteroid nicknamed ‘the golden asteroid’.
The asteroid orbits between Mars and Jupiter and is called 16 Psyche.
The asteroid is thought to contain a core of iron, nickel, and gold worth a whopping $10,000 quadrillion.
That’s enough money to make everyone on the planet a billionaire.
NASA will begin the journey to the 220km wide rock in October 2023.
What’s the mission?
The 16 Psyche asteroid is in the main asteroid belt in the solar system, between Jupiter and Mars.
This mission is part of Nasa’s new low-cost robotic Discovery program. The spacecraft will hope to learn more about unexplored asteroids like this one, particularly because unlike most we know to be icy and rocky – 16 Psyche is thought to be the exposed metallic heart of a dead planet.
It’ll blast off aboard a SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket – the world’s most powerful rocket in history – and when it gets there scientists hope it will help them understand more about Earth’s core.
