Europe's Hera spacecraft captures first close view of NASA's asteroid impact site

· Science · European Union

Europe's Hera spacecraft has captured its first clear view of the two asteroids involved in NASA's 2022 DART mission, the first test of deflecting a potentially hazardous space rock by crashing a spacecraft into it, ScienceDaily reports. Hera is now approaching the pair, which consists of the larger asteroid Didymos and its small moon Dimorphos, the body DART struck. The mission's job is to survey the aftermath of the collision and work out why the asteroid shifted far more than scientists had predicted, a key open question for any future planetary-defense attempt. The article does not give details on the spacecraft's arrival date or the measurements it will make. Hera is a European Space Agency mission, and its findings will inform models of how momentum is transferred when a spacecraft strikes an asteroid.

Why it matters：DART showed that hitting an asteroid can move it; Hera is meant to explain why it moved so much, which determines whether kinetic impact is a reliable planetary-defense tool against real threats.

Key points

  • Hera is observing Didymos and its moon Dimorphos, the DART target.
  • The mission will study why the asteroid shifted more than predicted.
  • DART in 2022 was the first test of deflecting an asteroid by impact.

Sources (original reporting)

More stories from this day