ESA’s Hera Probe Captures Rare Images of Mars’ Moon Deimos
The spacecraft’s flyby of Mars provided a gravity assist and groundbreaking data on the mysterious moon during its journey to study an asteroid collision.
- The European Space Agency's Hera spacecraft conducted a flyby of Mars on March 12, 2025, capturing unprecedented images of Deimos, the planet's smaller and less-studied moon.
- Hera used its trio of scientific instruments to image Deimos’ far side, analyze its mineral composition, and chart surface temperatures, offering new insights into the moon's origins.
- The flyby, which brought Hera within 625 miles of Deimos and 3,100 miles of Mars, provided a critical gravity assist for the spacecraft’s trajectory toward the Didymos asteroid system.
- Deimos, measuring just 8 miles wide, is thought to be either a captured asteroid or debris from a massive impact on Mars, and the new data aims to resolve this long-standing debate.
- Hera is en route to assess the aftermath of NASA's 2022 DART mission, which successfully altered the orbit of the asteroid Dimorphos, with arrival at the target system expected in December 2026.
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