2024-10-02 19:13:28
Asteroids are a real danger from space. Could such a boulder be fended off? The second part of a double mission will start soon.
Around 35,000 asteroids near Earth are currently known – impacts could be devastating. Meanwhile, humanity is no longer quite as helpless against the celestial bodies as it was decades ago. The European Space Agency Esa’s “Hera” mission, named after a Greek goddess, is intended to contribute to new findings – it is scheduled to start in a few days.
“Hera” is supposed to examine what the impact of the US space agency NASA’s “Dart” probe on Dimorphos, the smaller part of a double asteroid, caused. What does the approximately 160 meter long chunk look like now? Does it have a crater, has it been deformed? How heavy is he?
“Hera will answer these questions,” says asteroid expert Detlef Koschny, Professor of Lunar and Planetary Exploration at the Technical University of Munich. The mission is therefore an important contribution to the topic of planetary defense.
“Dart” (Double Asteroid Redirection Test) was launched in November 2021 and crashed into the asteroid in September 2022 at a speed of around 6.6 kilometers per second. The impact measurably changed the orbit of Dimorphos, a type of moon of the larger asteroid Didymos. “This showed that we can change the orbit of an asteroid that may be on a collision course,” says Koschny.
“We are now entering a new era of humanity in which we could have the opportunity to protect ourselves against the impact of an asteroid,” NASA said after the impact.
Impacts have shown several times in the history of our planet how devastating larger asteroids can be. A hit around 66 million years ago is considered to be primarily responsible for the extinction of the dinosaurs.
NASA and Esa want to be better prepared against such dangers in the future. “Hera” is scheduled to launch from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida on board a Falcon 9 rocket from the private space company SpaceX on October 7th at the earliest. In 2026, Hera is scheduled to enter an orbit around Didymos and then examine its moon using numerous instruments.
“We have been preparing for months,” says the head of the ESA control center, Simon Plum, about the upcoming launch. “We are on the right track and confident that we will be as prepared as possible.” Like most ESA missions, “Hera” is controlled from the control center in Darmstadt.
The ESA space safety program in Darmstadt is already preparing another asteroid mission: “Ramses” (Rapid Apophis Mission for Space Safety) is scheduled to examine the asteroid Apophis as it flies past Earth in 2029.
According to Esa, the chunk with a size of around 375 meters will fly past Earth on April 13, 2029 at a distance of only 32,000 kilometers. That’s very close by space standards – the moon is on average about 380,000 kilometers away from Earth.