Europe’s Hera probe has started performing detailed observations of an asteroid that was deliberately struck by NASA four years ago during a planetary defense experiment.
The European Space Agency announced that the Hera spacecraft is now studying Didymos and its moonlet Dimorphos from 15 miles to 18 miles away. In 2022, NASA’s Dart probe purposely crashed into tiny Dimorphos to determine whether this type of defensive tactic could potentially protect Earth from a hazardous asteroid in the future. The impact shortened the moonlet’s orbit around Didymos and nudged it into a slightly different path around the sun.
First Images Reveal New Surface Details
The Hera spacecraft has gotten its first close-up look at the Didymos binary asteroid system, Space reported.
“The first thing we said was, ‘Wow,'” Hera Principal Investigator Patrick Michel said in a statement about the image, which the European Space Agency reported. “This is the other side of Didymos from the one that DART’s camera showed us shortly before impact, so this feels like looking at a whole new world.”
The Didymos system consists of a 2,560-foot-wide space rock and its moonlet Dimorphos, which is about 530 feet in diameter. Before the impact, Dimorphos completed one lap around Didymos in around 11 hours and 55 minutes, but the collision reduced that period by roughly 33 minutes.
Hera Will Survey Dimorphos Using Science Instruments and Cubesats
Next month, the car-sized Hera will venture even closer to the asteroids, operating just 12 miles away. European Space Agency officials consider this a crash site investigation worthy of its finest robotic detective.
Hera carries 25 science instruments alongside a pair of shoebox-sized Cubesats designed to survey Dimorphos and attempt a landing. While Didymos retains the same central equatorial ridge visible during the initial 2022 impact, scientists note that many new boulders, craters, and ridges have formed across the surface.
“Since we expect a lot of impact-ejected material to have made it across the approximately 1 kilometer of space from Dimorphos to Didymos, it may be that some of these characteristics originate from this transport of material, and we have exciting work ahead of us to sort it out,” Michael Kueppers, ESA’s Hera mission scientist, said.
Frequently Asked Questions About the Asteroid Mission
How close is the Hera spacecraft to the asteroids right now?
The spacecraft is currently observing the Didymos system from a distance of 15 miles to 18 miles away. Mission operators plan to maneuver the car-sized probe even closer to 12 miles away next month.
What was the exact effect of the original 2022 impact?
The DART spacecraft struck Dimorphos on September 26, 2022, at a speed of around 14,000 miles per hour. The collision shortened the moonlet’s orbit around the primary asteroid by approximately 33 minutes.
When will the space agency release more images?
The European Space Agency plans to release even more detailed photographs of both asteroids on November 25, 2026.
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