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

Hera

Latest

Asteroid (18805) Kellyday
Space Safety

First asteroid sightings push Hera’s camera to the limit

06/08/2025 3862 views 56 likes
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Hera's autonomous surface feature tracking during Mars flyby
Space Safety

Hera asteroid mission tested self-driving technique at Mars

25/03/2025 3333 views 40 likes
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Cartoon Hera made using LEGO® bricks, designed by Frans Snik
Space Safety

Hera’s incredible adventures in brick building

13/03/2025 2452 views 31 likes
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Sir Brian May and the rest of Hera's science team see Mars image arrive
Space Safety

Hera asteroid mission spies Mars’s Deimos moon

13/03/2025 22316 views 137 likes
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Hera swings by Mars
Space Safety

Watch live: Images from Hera’s Mars flyby

10/03/2025 26776 views 117 likes
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  • Space Safety

    Hera planetary defence mission: solving asteroid mysteries

    23/09/2024 7540 views 146 likes
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  • Space Safety

    Hera asteroid mission - launch highlights

    07/10/2024 2623 views 48 likes
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  • Space Safety

    Images from Hera’s Mars flyby (Official broadcast)

    13/03/2025 1946 views 51 likes
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  • Space Safety

    Hera trajectory to Didymos

    15/04/2024 6488 views 76 likes
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  • Space Safety

    DART asteroid impact impresses in ESA’s view from the ground

    27/09/2022 66139 views 337 likes
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  • Space Safety

    Hera’s navigation around the asteroids

    15/04/2024 1530 views 27 likes
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  • Space Safety

    Look inside ESA’s Hera asteroid mission

    26/09/2024 2356 views 42 likes
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  • Space Safety

    The Incredible Adventures of the Hera mission – Presenting Hera

    01/06/2021 13915 views 327 likes
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Hera Overview