{"id":635503,"date":"2026-10-19T18:10:08","date_gmt":"2026-10-19T18:10:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/635503\/"},"modified":"2026-10-19T18:10:08","modified_gmt":"2026-10-19T18:10:08","slug":"hera-closes-in-on-asteroid-pair-to-study-the-impact-damage-of-nasas-dart-strike","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/635503\/","title":{"rendered":"Hera Closes In on Asteroid Pair to Study the Impact Damage of NASA\u2019s DART Strike"},"content":{"rendered":"

In September 2022, a NASA spacecraft violently smashed into a tiny asteroid<\/a> as a test of planetary defense. Now, a new probe is ready to check out the wreckage by rendezvousing with the space rock for a closer look.<\/p>\n

The European Space Agency (ESA) launched its Hera mission<\/a> on October 7, 2024, as a crucial follow-up to NASA\u2019s DART (Double Asteroid Redirection Test), a first-of-its-kind attempt to redirect the orbit of an asteroid. The small, car-sized spacecraft recently pulled off a braking maneuver to slow it down as it approaches the binary asteroid system before it makes its first close flyby in early November.<\/p>\n

Hera is set to perform a detailed, post-impact survey with the aim of turning a one-time, space experiment into a well-understood planetary defense mechanism. The mission could also help scientists learn more about how asteroids form.<\/p>\n

Collision ahead <\/p>\n

For the DART test, NASA sent a 1,340-pound spacecraft (607 kilograms) and smashed it into Dimorphos, a 558-foot-wide (170-meter) space rock that orbits its larger 2,625-foot-wide (800-meter) companion, Didymos. Ground-based observations revealed that, following the collision, Dimorphos\u2019s orbital period around Didymos shortened from 11 hours and 55 minutes to 11 hours and 23 minutes.<\/p>\n

The mission was deemed a success, demonstrating that a spacecraft could deliberately alter an asteroid\u2019s motion. But successfully hitting an asteroid and understanding exactly what that impact did are two different things. To understand the full consequences of the impact, scientists needed a closer investigation.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s where Hera comes in, armed with a suite of science instruments to inspect the asteroid after the collision and investigate whether DART\u2019s success can be turned into a dependable strategy for protecting Earth.<\/p>\n

Enter, Hera <\/p>\n

Ground-based observations are estimated to be stuck with a 10% residual uncertainty with their measurements, and models of the impact still haven\u2019t been able to calculate the mass and makeup of Dimorphos, according to ESA.<\/p>\n

Once it reaches Dimorphos, Hera will not only investigate the scene of the crime, it will also measure the asteroid\u2019s mass, as well as its shifted orbit in a far more accurate way. Hera will also conduct the most detailed survey of a binary asteroid system, which make up about 15% of all known asteroids, yet none have ever been studied up close before.<\/p>\n

Earlier this month, Hera got its first look at its target. The spacecraft imaged<\/a> the Didymos binary asteroid system from an approximate distance of 146,954 miles (236,500 kilometers) away. On October 15, Hera performed<\/a> a braking maneuver to fine-tune its trajectory toward the pair of space rocks and fired its thrusters to come close to matching the asteroids\u2019 velocity.<\/p>\n

In early November, the spacecraft will come within 20 miles (30 kilometers) of the asteroids and begin gathering data. Hera will continue to move in closer to the asteroid system before it deploys a pair of shoebox-sized cubesats, named Milani and Juventas, in January 2027. Milani is tasked with identifying the composition of materials on and around Dimorphos while Juventas will use a radar to peer inside the interior of the asteroid.<\/p>\n

After a two-year journey through space, Hera is expected to spend at least six months surveying the Didymos asteroid system, examining the aftermath of NASA\u2019s DART impact and gathering data to advance planetary defence.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"In September 2022, a NASA spacecraft violently smashed into a tiny asteroid as a test of planetary defense.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":635504,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[17228,28013,1022,3323,111,139,69,147,392],"class_list":["post-635503","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-space","tag-asteroids","tag-dart-mission","tag-esa","tag-nasa","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-science","tag-space"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/635503","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=635503"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/635503\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/635504"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=635503"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=635503"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=635503"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}