Dodging stormy weather ahead Hurricane MiltonSpaceX launched the European Space Agency's $398 million Hera probe on Monday for a follow-up flight to find out exactly how a moon orbiting a small asteroid was affected by the rapid impact of NASA's DART probe in 2022.
The launch doubted until the last moment, with thick clouds and rain along Florida's Space Coast, fueled by moisture drawn in by the intensifying hurricane to the west.
But as launch time approached, conditions improved enough to meet launch safety rules and NASA managers cleared the rocket for liftoff. Right on time, at 10:52 a.m. EDT, the Falcon 9's first stage engines ignited with a burst of flames and the booster climbed smoothly away from the Cape Canaveral Space Force Station.
The launch came in the nick of time for several hundred European Space Agency executives, scientists, engineers and journalists who flew to Florida to witness the launch.
Hurricane Milton is expected to bring with it extreme wind and heavy rain to Florida's Space Coast on Wednesday, a forecast that prompted NASA to abandon plans Thursday to launch the $5.2 billion Europa mission to Jupiter and its ice-covered moon Europa.
Instead, NASA announced late Sunday that the rocket and its precious cargo will remain in a SpaceX hangar at the base of Launch Pad 39A at the Kennedy Space Center until Milton passes by and security personnel have a chance to inspect spaceport facilities for signs of damage .
The weather has also derailed NASA's plans to return three NASA astronauts and a Russian cosmonaut to Earth after a 217-day stay aboard the International Space Station.
Crew commander Matthew Dominick, Mike Barratt, Jeanette Epps and cosmonaut Alexander Grebenkin planned to disengage Monday.
But NASA announced Sunday that their departure would be postponed until at least Thursday due to expected bad weather. Crew Dragon ferries require calm winds and seas in the Gulf of Mexico or Atlantic Ocean to land safely.
Mission to an asteroid and its moon
In the meantime, despite an initially gloomy forecast, SpaceX was able to take advantage of a break in the weather to launch Hera's two-year journey to the asteroid Didymos and its small moon Dimorphos.
The DART impact changed the 11 hour and 55 minute orbit of the 140 meter wide Dimorphos, saving 31 minutes of time needed to complete one trip around the mother planet Didymos. The test confirmed the feasibility of one day knocking a menacing asteroid off course before a potentially devastating impact with Earth.
But a successful deflection would depend on a number of factors, including when the threat was detected - the further away, the better - and the composition of the asteroid.
ESA's Hera probe will orbit the Didymos system and study both asteroids in detail with eleven high-tech cameras and other instruments, deploying two small "cubesat" satellites to study the internal structure of Dimorphos, the DART impact crater and the internal structure of the moon. compound.
The goal of the Asteroid Impact and Deflection Assessment, or AIDA, is to better understand the techniques that may be needed to avoid an impact with Earth.
"The good news is that there won't be a dinosaur killer heading towards Earth for the next 100 years," said Richard Moissl, director of ESA's Planetary Defense Office. "We're safe from that scenario, but there are smaller ones, especially at this dangerous size, 50 meters and higher, that really threaten human life on the ground."
The first step in planetary defense is detection, he said, followed by detailed observations to determine the asteroid's orbit and whether a collision with Earth is possible.
"For small objects, civil protection is the right choice," he said. "But with a diameter of 50 meters (160 feet) and larger, you really don't want this thing to hit the Earth or threaten any population centers. And then step three comes into play: deflection.
"But then again, it's always good to know what you're dealing with. And this is where Hera and DART come into play."
Unlike most Falcon 9 flights, there were no plans to repair the rocket's first stage. To give Hera the speed needed to break away from Earth's gravity, the Falcon 9's two stages were programmed to use up all their propellants, leaving no reserve for a powered landing on the first stage .
The flight plan called for two upper stage engine firings before releasing Hera to fly independently an hour and 16 minutes after takeoff.
To reach Didymos and Dimorphos, Hera will need to fire a deep space thruster in November to set up a gravity-assisted flight past Mars in March, sailing within about 6,000 kilometers of the red planet. Along the way, the spacecraft will pass the small Martian moon Deimos within a radius of 1,000 kilometers.
"By swinging through Mars' gravitational field in its direction of motion, the spacecraft gains extra speed for its onward journey," ESA project scientist Michael Kueppers said on the agency's website.
"This encounter is not part of Hera's nuclear mission, but we will have activated some of our scientific instruments anyway. It gives us another chance to calibrate our instruments and possibly make some scientific discoveries."
After another in-orbit maneuver in February 2026, Hera will finally be on track to enter orbit around Didymos in October next year. The mission is expected to last about six months.
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