Play Live Radio
Next Up:
0:00
0:00
0:00 0:00
Available On Air Stations

NASA Space Probe Reaches Comet

Fourth of July fireworks started early in California as scientists at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory celebrated the collision of its space probe with a comet 83 million miles away.

The impact occurred at 1:52 a.m. EDT Monday, according to NASA. Scientists hope the experiment will shed light on the formation of planets in the solar system billions of years ago.

Copyright 2022 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.

David Kestenbaum is a correspondent for NPR, covering science, energy issues and, most recently, the global economy for NPR's multimedia project Planet Money. David has been a science correspondent for NPR since 1999. He came to journalism the usual way — by getting a Ph.D. in physics first.