The government agency – full name National Aeronautics and Space Administration – announced in 2023 that it was preparing to fire an orbiting aircraft up to the celestial rock, which is officially named ’16 Psyche’.

Uniquely, this mighty space floater – measuring 173 miles (280 km) across and 144 miles (232 km) long – contains precious materials including gold, iron and nickel.

In a statement published at the time, NASA shared: “Teams of engineers and technicians are working almost around the clock to ensure the orbiter is ready to journey 2.5 billion miles to a metal-rich asteroid that may tell us more about planetary cores and how planets form.”

NASA have their eyes on 16 Psyche, a metal-rich asteroid worth a LOT of money (CHANDAN KHANNA/AFP via Getty Images)

Since the spacecraft’s launch from Florida’s Kennedy Space Center in October 2023, mission controllers at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory have dedicated over a year to checking over the spacecraft’s system; whether it’s still operational for deep space travel.

2.5 billion miles away, the asteroid is located in the belt between Mars and Jupiter, and NASA has produced a timeline of intended events.

The orbiter will hopefully reach its destination in August 2029, where it’ll spend a total of two research years.

Whilst positioned there, it will measure the floating formation’s gravity, magnetic properties and overall composition with specialist equipmentBut three years prior to this, in May 2026, the vessel is set to receive a gravitational momentum boost from the Red Planet, effectively hoisting it further towards 16 Psyche.

November 2031 is when the mission is scheduled to wrap up, allowing NASA to finally bring home the shiny beacon as it were.

Explaining 16 Psyche’s significance, Nicola Fox of NASA’s science mission directorate said: “Psyche is by far the largest [asteroid], and that’s why we want to go to it. Because the smaller ones are more likely to have been changed by things impacting them, whereas the big one, we think, is going to be completely unchanged.”

NASA hopes to have the mission wrapped up by November 2031 (Getty Stock Image)

In other space news, Tesla CEO Elon Musk recently told podcaster Joe Rogan that it’s only ‘a matter of time’ before humankind gets walloped by an asteroid.

Such is the billionaire’s belief in this doom theory, he then suggested we should adopt a ‘second planet’ to ‘preserve civilisation’.