Hera asteroid mission’s Mars flyby
Video: 00:01:36 On Wednesday 12 March 2025 ESA’s Hera spacecraft for planetary defence performs a flyby of Mars. The gravity of the red planet shifts the spacecraft’s trajectory towards its final destination of the Didymos binary asteroid system, shortening its trip by months and saving substantial fuel.Watch the livestream release of images from Hera’s flyby by the mission’s science team on Thursday 13 March, starting at 11:50 CET!Hera comes to around 5000 km from the surface of Mars during its flyby. It will also image Deimos, the smaller of Mars’s two moons, from a minimum 1000 km away (while venturing as close as 300 km). Hera will also image Mars’s larger moon Phobos as it begins to move away from Mars.Launched on 7 October 2024, Hera on its way to visit the first asteroid to have had its orbit altered by human action. By gathering close-up data about the Dimorphos asteroid,...
