Mars appears bright blue in this near-infrared image taken by Hera's spacecraft. The month's deimos is a dark mark towards the center of the image
ESA
Space exploration mission to study asteroids that NASA deliberately crashed a spacecraft three years ago takes stunning bonus images of Mars and its moon Deimos is on the way to his final destination.
NASA's 2022 Double Planet Redirect Test (DART) was an attempt to show that bodies on a collision course with the planet could be deliberately redirected to avoid catastrophic effects. Observations from Earth showed that NASA successfully alters the orbit of the asteroid by crushing the 610-kilogram ship into distant asteroid shaped leaves at 6.6 km/sec. Dimorphos did not present any risk to the Earth, and simply acted as a subject.
Hera is a subsequent European Space Agency mission designed to explore the effects of crashes in detail. The craft is the size of a small car weighing 1081 kilograms when fully fueled. It was released on October 7, 2024 from Cape Canaveral, Florida, aboard the SpaceX Falcon 9 Rocket, and on March 12, 2025 I made a flyby to Mars on my way to the asteroid.
Deimos looks dark surrounded by Mars
ESA
Hera came close to 5,000 kilometers to the surface of Mars, received a gravity boost and cast it at Dimorphos. The operation reduced travel time by months and saved fuel.
It was very close to Mars, but I was able to turn on the trio of sensors to take detailed photos of some of the planets. Demos in the same frame. We captured images, infrared cameras and hyperspectral imagers that can sense different colors beyond the limits of the human eye using a 1020 x 1020 pixel resolution.
Hera moved at 9 km/sec compared to Mars, allowing him to image Deimos, a distance of just 1000 kilometers, ranging from 12.4 kilometers long. You can also photograph the side of the moon, which is attractively trapped from Mars, but that's not very common.
Deimos shines much brighter than Mars in this shot taken by Hera's thermal infrared imager
ESA/JAXA
The first concept behind the Hera mission was that it existed when Dart collided with Dimorphos, but delays in funding made it impossible. It will arrive a few years after the impact.
The mission also features two miniature satellites, called Juventus and Milani, or Cubesat. Rather than rotating the traits, these will fly before them and make a drastic pass at smaller, risky distances to collect data. Both are expected to look better if they eventually land on an asteroid and do everything they can in the distance.
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Source: www.newscientist.com
