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The European Space Agency has announced an update of its Hera spacecraft which is expected to be the first human mission towards a binary asteroid. ESA said the spacecraft has entered its next phase of technical design. ( ESA | ScienceOffice.org )
The space mission Hera, proposed by the European Space Agency, is heading towards a binary asteroid to support NASA's planetary defense plan against a potential collision of asteroids.
The NASA double asteroid rerouting test or DART mission should be run with a binary asteroid in October 2022 and then again in 2024. After the impact, all connections to the binary asteroid are made. stop and essential information will be missing. At this point, the Hera spacecraft will then head to the location to measure all the possible effects of NASA's intentional collision with the asteroid.
The Hera spacecraft is expected to reach the target by 2026. At that time, NASA's DART had historically altered the orbit duration of the target asteroid.
The binary asteroid
The target of the mission is a pair of Near-Earth asteroids called Didymos. It is composed of two bodies: the Didymos A or what is unofficially called the Didymain which measures about 2,560 feet; and the Didymos B or what is unofficially called as the Didymoon which measures about 530 feet. In comparison, the latter is about the same size as the Great Pyramid of Giza.
The mbad of other planetary bodies can be measured by calculating their gravitational attraction on a spacecraft. However, this method will not work with the Didymos because the gravitational field of Didymoon will be mastered by the Didymain.
Didymoon, orbiting Didymain, is therefore the main objective of the Hera mission. After the impact of DART on Didymoon, Hera will study its mbad, the crater shape created by the collision and its physical and dynamic properties. The Hera spacecraft will also deploy the first CubeSats in deep space of Europe.
"Such a binary asteroid system is the perfect test bench for a planetary defense experiment, but it's also an entirely new environment for asteroid research," said Ian Carnelli, mission manager for the spaceship Hera. He added that binary asteroids accounted for about 15% of all identified asteroids, but that binaries had never been explored before.
Didymoon will become the smallest asteroid to be visited and Hera will face the challenge of achieving high resolution scientific, visual and radiological mapping of its outer and inner surface.
Space Hera Mission
All images and relevant data to be acquired by Hera will then be used to badyze Didymain. For one, the Didymain mbad can be calculated with a precision of about 90 percent by measuring the oscillation that Didymoon causes the Didymain.
"These key data collected by Hera will turn a grandiose but unique experience into a well-understood planetary defense technique – a technique that could in principle be repeated if we ever had to stop an incoming asteroid," Carnelli added.
On June 25, ESA announced that Hera was entering its next phase of technical design.
Collision of potential asteroids
To date, DART has pbaded its preliminary design examination and NASA is about to begin its design process. The mission specifically involved testing a planetary defense strategy called "kinetic impactor technique" which involves hitting the asteroid to move its orbit. This strategy is the best way to defend the Earth against future impacts of asteroids.
The ESA update on Hera comes after the announcement made by NASA last week about the national plan for preparing land objects. The plan, which was originally released by the White House, detailed the steps that the government and the space agency would put in place in the event that an asteroid hit the Earth.
Earlier this week, a study, which badyzed data from 2013 to 2016, revealed that there could still be thousands of unconfirmed NEOs approaching the Earth. The study asked the parties involved to develop accurate statistical data on these unconfirmed space objects. Indeed, on June 21, an asteroid exploded on Russia and NASA was able to detect it only after its impact.
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