European Space Agency to send spacecraft past Mars for 'crime scene investigation'

economictimes.indiatimes.com:

Hera spacecraft on a groundbreaking mission to study the aftermath of NASA’s Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART), which deliberately crashed into the asteroid Dimorphos in 2022. This marked the first real test of Earth's planetary defences, with the goal of deflecting a potential planet-threatening asteroid. Hera will inspect the asteroid to understand the damage caused by the impact and gather crucial data about Dimorphos.

DART’s successful deflection: Humanity’s first planetary defence test

The DART mission successfully altered the course of Dimorphos, a pyramid-sized asteroid located 11 million kilometres (6.8 million miles) from Earth. The impactor, about the size of a fridge, managed to knock the asteroid off its original path. This was a significant step in demonstrating that humanity can potentially defend itself from future asteroid threats.

Why Hera’s ‘crime scene investigation’ is necessary

However, many questions remain unanswered. Scientists are still unsure how much damage was done and what the asteroid was like before the impact. To address these unknowns, the European Space Agency said it was sending Hera to the asteroid to conduct a «crime scene investigation» in the hopes of learning how Earth can best fend off asteroids that pose a threat.

Hera is tentatively set to launch on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from Cape Canaveral, Florida. However, a recent «anomaly» during the launch of SpaceX’s Crew-9 astronaut mission has raised the possibility of a delay. ESA’s Hera project manager, Ian Carnelli,