Small-body mission · ESA

Hera

ESA's follow-up to DART and the European half of the AIDA collaboration — it is cruising to the Didymos–Dimorphos system to survey the crater DART left and measure Dimorphos's mass, turning the DART experiment into a well-characterised deflection.

ActiveOrbiter Mission Rendezvous Mission

This is the small-body-missions view of Hera. See its main mission page for the full profile.

Targets & sample

Target bodies:65803 Didymos Dimorphos

Mission & science

Goals: Characterise the outcome of the DART impact — Dimorphos's mass, the crater, and internal structure.
Engineering milestones: Launched in October 2024; arrival at the Didymos system planned for late 2026.
Outcome: In cruise — no results yet.
Known limitations: En route; the encounter has not yet happened.

Knowledge connections

Target of65803 Didymos
Target ofDimorphos
Member of groupOrbiter Mission
Member of groupRendezvous Mission
Launched byFalcon 9
Operated byESA
Associated withAIDA
Tracked byESTRACK
Associated withCharacterization
Associated withKinetic Impactor

Sources

Facts on this topic will be cited from these primary and reference sources.

ESAEuropean Space Agency
European missions, observatories, and space science imagery.

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