10/10/2024
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The day started with an 85% probability that unhealthy climate would trigger a launch delay: it ended with ESA’s Hera mission efficiently in house and en path to the Didymos binary asteroid system.
At 16:52 CEST (14:52 UTC) on 7 October 2024, Hera took to the skies aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from Cape Canaveral Area Pressure Station in Florida, USA. After a easy 76-minute ascent, the spacecraft separated from its launcher, and, a couple of minutes later, ESA’s ESOC mission operations centre in Germany assumed management of the spacecraft.
Here’s what has occurred since then.
Hera’s first days in house
The primary telemetry kind Hera arrived on Earth through NASA’s Goldstone station at 18:12 CEST and confirmed the spacecraft’s profitable separation from the launcher.
By 18:24 CEST, each of Hera’s 5 m photo voltaic arrays had deployed and the spacecraft had begun to generate energy.
ESA’s Flight Dynamics staff rapidly confirmed that the SpaceX launcher had delivered Hera into the proper orbit and mission controllers started activating the spacecraft’s different core techniques.
We’ve got a mission!!#HeraMission‘s photo voltaic arrays have deployed and its batteries are charging. The satellite tv for pc is in good well being and the primary instructions have been confirmed on board. pic.twitter.com/ChckwCmNw9
— ESA Operations (@esaoperations) October 7, 2024
Over the following 54 hours, Hera powered on and examined its star trackers (used for navigation) and its response wheels (used to manage Hera’s orientation in house).
Mission management additionally examined the communication antennas that Hera will use to remain in contact with Earth through ESA’s Estrack floor station community and performed a profitable thruster take a look at, throughout which every thruster was fired briefly to make sure correct performance forward of Hera’s upcoming deep house manoeuvre.
“It has been an action-packed few days,” says Sylvain Lodiot, Hera Spacecraft Operations Supervisor. “We’ve got fine-tuned a few of the techniques, however general, Hera’s first days in house have gone very properly. The {hardware} is performing properly, and we have already uplinked a number of software program updates.”
What’s subsequent for Hera?
Hera is now already greater than 1,000,000 kilometres from Earth. Over the following few weeks, the spacecraft’s suite of scientific devices shall be step by step powered on and examined. These devices will acquire precious information about Didymos and its moonlet, Dimorphos, as soon as Hera arrives on the binary asteroid system in late 2026. Particularly, Hera will assist scientists higher perceive the construction of Dimorphos and the way it was altered by NASA’s DART mission, which intentionally crashed into the asteroid in 2022 within the first take a look at of asteroid deflection.
Hera may also examine how binary asteroid techniques like Didymos kind and performance. As the primary spacecraft to rendezvous with a binary asteroid system, Hera will present distinctive perception into these celestial our bodies, which account for round 15% of all recognized asteroids.
Hera’s first deep house manoeuvre will start in late October and put the spacecraft on the right track for its subsequent main milestone, a flyby of Mars in March 2025. Throughout this flyby, Hera will use its devices to check Deimos, the smaller and extra enigmatic of Mars’s two moons. This can function an necessary take a look at for lots of the spacecraft’s devices, guaranteeing they’re totally operational earlier than the spacecraft arrives at its closing vacation spot, Didymos.
Hera will carry out a second deep house manoeuvre in February 2026. An ‘impulsive rendezvous’ in October 2026 will convey Hera into the neighborhood of the Didymos asteroid system. The spacecraft will start its detailed survey of the moonlet Dimorphos in 2027, which is able to flip the 151 m asteroid into one of the studied objects within the Photo voltaic System.
A easy begin and a vibrant future
Reflecting on the mission thus far, Hera Flight Operations Director Ignacio Tanco famous that whereas the staff has confronted various challenges anticipated, as is predicted with each launch, Hera’s Launch and Early Orbit Section (LEOP) has been with none main points: “I wish to categorical my gratitude to all of the groups concerned within the preparation and execution of this primary part of the Hera mission. Hera went by a tense and inconceivable launch, however collectively we have now transformed that into a really easy and profitable LEOP.”
As Hera enters its roughly two-month Close to-Earth Commissioning Section, Hera Mission Supervisor Ian Carnelli expressed his thanks for the dedication proven by everybody concerned within the mission: “Hera is an unbelievable mission: there’s by no means a uninteresting second. Design, growth, launch – each stage of the mission threw challenges and surprises at us, however the whole lot has gone even higher than I may have hoped. I may have by no means dreamt of a greater staff. I wish to take this chance to thank everybody concerned from the underside of my coronary heart for the unbelievable effort. I can not wait to proceed this journey.”
“Didymos, right here we come.”
