Protecting Earth from asteroid impacts: HERA - the planetary defence mission

Large asteroids are a real threat to Earth and all of humanity.
With the ‪@EuropeanSpaceAgency‬ mission Hera, we are expanding our knowledge of asteroids - to protect our home planet.
Details: https://www.dlr.de/de/aktuelles/nachr...

An asteroid is hurtling towards Earth – what can we humans do to prevent a collision?
A large asteroid impact is a very rare but extremely serious natural disaster!
Every now and then, we suffer the impact of smaller asteroids – in 2013, for example, the Chelyabinsk asteroid injured several hundred people and severely damaged thousands of buildings, merely as a result of the shock wave it created when it exploded high up in Earth's atmosphere.
The size, mass and speed of asteroids are the key factors behind their destructive power. Sixty six million years ago, an asteroid between 10 and 15 kilometres in size travelling at a speed of 72,000 kilometres per hou collided with Earth. It is assumed that this led to the extinction of the dinosaurs.
The massive Chicxulub impact crater on the Yucatán Peninsula in Mexico has been preserved to this day.
At the Kennedy Space Center in Florida, not far from this crater, we will now be launching a space mission to protect Earth from asteroid impacts: Hera – ESA's first planetary defence mission.
After all, the question is not whether, but when the next major asteroid will impact Earth.
Hera will embark on a journey to a binary asteroid system consisting of the asteroids Dimorphos and Didymos. But why are these two asteroids so special?
A NASA space probe intentionally hit the approximately 170-metre asteroid Dimorphos in 2022: This was the DART mission. The main aim of the mission was and is to find out whether the trajectory of the celestial body was altered by the targeted impact.
Even a minimal deflection of an asteroid in space could prevent it from hitting the Earth and therefore sending it soaring past our home planet.
This is the surface of the asteroid Dimorphos! A real photo – the last image acquired by the DART space probe.
The impact had the desired effect – the asteroid's trajectory was altered.
However, the details of what exactly happened to Dimorphos afterwards are not fully known. Did DART's impact leave a crater? Exactly how effective was the deflection? What happened to the asteroid?
Hera will come close to the two asteroids in October 2026, enter their orbit and study them in detail for six months.
The space probe has 12 scientific instruments on board for these investigations. This is how we intend to expand our knowledge of asteroids.
What are they made of? What would happen if an asteroid similar to Dimorphos were to enter Earth's atmosphere? Would it remain intact or break up into many pieces?
Hera is also carrying two shoebox-sized CubeSats. In the final phase of the mission, these will even attempt to land on Dimorphos to study its surface characteristics, interior structure and gravitational field.
The data Hera collects will help us turn these unique experiments into a reproducible technique that we will be able to use to protect Earth.
Like most space missions, Hera is a joint product of many countries and agencies. In addition to NASA, our friends at the Japanese Space Agency JAXA are also involved in Hera and are contributing the expertise gained from the Hayabusa-2 asteroid mission. Germany is leading the mission within ESA with a share of over 37 percent.
The Hera spacecraft was developed and built by OHB in Bremen.
Companies such as HPS and Jena-Optronik also contributed instruments. And last but not least, numerous scientists are involved in the Hera Science Team.
Based on everything we know, a collision is not likely in this century. So although there is no reason to panic, there is reason enough for humanity to be prepared. And that's what we're doing!
After Hera comes Ramses: The Ramses space probe could – if the ESA member states decide to fund it – be launched as early as 2028. We want to use it to study the near-Earth asteroid Apophis, which will fly past us at a distance of just 32,000 kilometres, that is, between our navigation and telecommunications satellites in geostationary orbit and us on Earth's surface. That is extremely close and very rare!
When we talk about asteroid defence, we find ourselves in the grey area between science, science fiction and reality.
The DART and Hera missions are real. And highly exciting for this reason alone, because we are concerned with protecting humanity and defending our planet!