ESA - Hera - Archive

ESA title

As part of the world’s first test of asteroid deflection, Hera will perform a detailed post-impact survey of the target asteroid, Dimorphos – the orbiting moonlet of a binary asteroid system known as Didymos.

Now that NASA’s DART mission has impacted the moonlet, Hera will turn the grand-scale experiment into a well-understood and repeatable planetary defence technique.

Demonstrating new technologies from autonomous navigation around an asteroid to low gravity proximity operations, Hera will be humankind’s first probe to rendezvous with a binary asteroid system and Europe’s flagship Planetary Defender.

Launch: 7 October 2024

Target: Asteroid Dimorphos

Rendezvous: December 2026

151mtarget asteroid
1stbinary asteroid survey
12payloads
2CubeSats

Hera

Hera's Core Module lowered onto Propulsion Module

Hera asteroid spacecraft assembled

24/08/2023 6016 views 54 likes

Juventas studies asteroid's internal structure

Hera’s mini-radar will probe asteroid’s heart

10/08/2023 5665 views 65 likes

Hubble sees boulders escaping from asteroid Dimorphos

Science & Exploration

Hubble sees boulders escaping from asteroid Dimorphos

20/07/2023 11139 views 122 likes

Dimorphos asteroid seen by DART

Imagine walking on Hera’s asteroid

30/06/2023 4723 views 78 likes

Hera and its CubeSats at Didymos system

Precision deployer to put Hera’s CubeSats into asteroid orb…

29/06/2023 3789 views 41 likes

GRASS gravimeter on shaker

Instrument to measure asteroid gravity tested for space

22/05/2023 6677 views 66 likes

Hera, her CubeSats, and their rocky target destination

What colour is an asteroid? Hyperspectral imager to find out

24/04/2023 3265 views 44 likes

Science & Exploration

Hubble captures movie of DART asteroid impact debris

01/03/2023 10381 views 77 likes

Hera, her CubeSats, and their rocky target destination

Eyes on Hera: Asteroid mission’s cameras ready

23/02/2023 7850 views 111 likes

LICIACube image of asteroid ejecta

First kinetic impact test succeeds in shifting asteroid orb…

12/10/2022 6345 views 55 likes

DART's moment of impact

Hera team congratulates NASA asteroid impactors

27/09/2022 8966 views 85 likes

Plume ejects from Dimorphos as DART impacts

ESA to capture light from deflected asteroid’s new plume

26/09/2022 25224 views 79 likes

DART impacting asteroid

ESA deep space network tracks DART asteroid impact

20/09/2022 15196 views 104 likes

DART impacting Dimorphos

After NASA’s asteroid impact, ESA’s Hera comes next

01/09/2022 14820 views 101 likes

Space Safety & Security at ESA

New home for Earth’s protectors

12/04/2022 10231 views 67 likes

ESA's 4.5m tracking antenna, New Norcia, Western Australia

Enabling & Support

Catching asteroid deflection mission's first words

22/11/2021 13165 views 104 likes

NASA's DART impacting asteroid

Planetary defenders: after NASA’s DART comes ESA’s Hera

18/11/2021 8303 views 79 likes

Ariane 6 will use an optional add-on Astris kick stage developed by ArianeGroup to target new missions

Enabling & Support

Ariane 6 targets new missions with Astris kick stage

13/07/2021 11320 views 76 likes

Milani scans Didymos

CubeSat will sift asteroid secrets from reflected sunshine

30/06/2021 6453 views 53 likes

Milani studies asteroid dust

CubeSat named for pioneer of European planetary defence

30/06/2021 3117 views 26 likes

Space Safety

Hang out with Europe’s top space experts

23/06/2021 8679 views 56 likes

NASA's DART impacting asteroid

Enabling & Support

Sourcing space debris and surveying asteroid smash: challen…

07/06/2021 1850 views 34 likes

Hera in space

The Incredible Adventures of the Hera mission – Presenting …

01/06/2021 6244 views 76 likes

Stero view of simulated Didymos breakup

Brian May helps show Hera’s target asteroid may be ‘dust bu…

30/03/2021 4337 views 37 likes

Still from Hera full dome show

ESA’s Hera mission – fulldome show for planetaria

02/02/2021 5181 views 48 likes

Hera leaving Earth

Ireland helping ESA’s Hera asteroid mission find its way

11/12/2020 21533 views 54 likes

Reentry of Hayabusa2's sample capsule

Hera team congratulates JAXA on asteroid sample return

06/12/2020 6694 views 145 likes

Infrared imaging of the impact crater

Industry starts work on Europe’s Hera planetary defence mis…

15/09/2020 8955 views 63 likes

Didymos asteroids

Name given to asteroid target of ESA’s planetary defence mi…

23/06/2020 7151 views 33 likes

Space Safety

An Agency for asteroids

23/06/2020 4717 views 27 likes

Incoming asteroid

ESA highlights protection for our planet ahead of Asteroid …

22/06/2020 8352 views 67 likes

Brian May, Astrophysicist and Rockstar

Queen’s Brian May works to probe origin of asteroids

02/06/2020 10592 views 64 likes

Hera leaving Earth

Amateur astronomers: help choose asteroid flybys for Hera

26/11/2019 4223 views 34 likes

Juventas CubeSat closing on asteroid

Luxembourg firm enabling peek inside asteroid

18/11/2019 2876 views 21 likes

Hera scans DART’s impact crater

Apollo astronaut champions Hera for planetary defence

05/11/2019 3719 views 44 likes

Juventas radar CubeSat

Hera’s radar CubeSat will peer into asteroid’s heart

23/10/2019 3198 views 5 likes

NASA's DART impacting asteroid

Driving diamond into asteroid dust helps model planetary de…

19/09/2019 2813 views 13 likes

Hera approaches the impact scene

A burst of asteroid activity in Europe

10/09/2019 13263 views 101 likes

Hera at Dimorphos

Europe and US teaming up for asteroid deflection

02/09/2019 31003 views 162 likes

CubeSat approaching asteroid

When CubeSats meet asteroid

28/06/2019 6597 views 78 likes

DART impacting asteroid

Will DART make its target asteroid go wobbly? Hera will see

27/06/2019 3587 views 54 likes

Asteroid Ryugu

ESA marks Asteroid Day on 30 June

24/06/2019 6187 views 57 likes

Hera surveying Dimorphos

Hera asteroid mission’s brain to be radiation-hard and fail…

11/06/2019 5239 views 65 likes

Side by side observation and artist's impression of Asteroid 1999 KW4

Binary asteroids, key to Earth’s planetary defence

04/06/2019 7427 views 56 likes

Hera mission patch

Hera gets its own logo

03/05/2019 3135 views 15 likes

APEX CubeSat

Hera’s APEX CubeSat will reveal the stuff that asteroids ar…

02/05/2019 7000 views 68 likes

Juventas CubeSat

Hera’s CubeSat to perform first radar probe of an asteroid

01/05/2019 9849 views 87 likes

SCI impactor on way to Ryugu asteroid

Earth vs. asteroids: humans strike back

22/04/2019 12816 views 148 likes

Infrared imaging of the impact crater

Self-driving spacecraft set for planetary defence expedition

05/04/2019 7062 views 64 likes

Bright spots on Ceres

ESA’s Hera asteroid mission borrows eyes of NASA’s Dawn

18/03/2019 7952 views 96 likes

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