Video: 00:04:41

At some point, statistically speaking, a large asteroid will impact Earth. Whether that’s tomorrow, in ten years, or a problem for our ancestors, ESA is getting prepared.

As part of the world’s first test of asteroid deflection, ESA’s Hera mission will perform a detailed post-impact survey of Dimorphos – the 160-metre asteroid struck, and successfully deflected, by NASA’s DART spacecraft.

Hera will soon study the aftermath. Launching in October 2024, Hera will turn this grand-scale experiment into a well-understood and hopefully repeatable planetary defence technique.

But before Hera and its two CubeSats fly, they’re rigorously tested at ESA’s ESTEC test

Sydney, Australia (SPX) Oct 20, 2023
China's forthcoming rocket designed for manned space missions, Long March 10, is on course for its initial launch around 2027, says a senior designer from the project team. The advanced launch vehicle is being developed at the China Academy of Launch Vehicle Technology (CALT), a primary contributor to rocketry in China and a subsidiary of the China Aerospace Science and Technology Corp. Zh

Baikonur, Kazakhstan (AFP) Oct 20, 2023
Surrounded by the vast sand dunes of the Kazakh steppe, on satellite images the city of Baikonur looks like an oasis of glimmering lights in an otherwise dry desert. Leased by Russia from Kazakhstan since the collapse of the USSR, the legendary launch site was for years the heart of the Soviet space programme, sending both the first artificial satellite and human into space. Russia, whos

Baltimore MD (SPX) Oct 20, 2023
Jupiter has some of the most conspicuous atmospheric features in our solar system. The planet's Great Red Spot, large enough to envelop Earth, is nearly as well known as some of the various rivers and mountains on the planet we call home. However, much like Earth, Jupiter is ever-changing, and there's much about the planet we have yet to learn. NASA's James Webb Space Telescope is unlockin

San Diego CA (SPX) Oct 20, 2023
Everyone has an origin story, including the universe. The Big Bang Theory is the leading explanation for the universe's origin - one that began 13.8 billion years ago from an incomprehensibly dense, hot pinprick that underwent an expansion so rapid that "violent" doesn't begin to capture it. About 400,000 years after the Big Bang, the cosmos cooled enough for photons to travel freely, crea

Munich, Germany (SPX) Oct 20, 2023
An international team has spotted a remote blast of cosmic radio waves lasting less than a millisecond. This 'fast radio burst' (FRB) is the most distant ever detected. Its source was pinned down by the European Southern Observatory's (ESO) Very Large Telescope (VLT) in a galaxy so far away that its light took eight billion years to reach us. The FRB is also one of the most energetic ever observ

Kennedy Space Center FL (SPX) Oct 20, 2023
Heart disease is the leading cause of death globally, and once cardiovascular tissue is damaged, there's no means of restoring its function. But it's possible damaged tissue could be regenerated via stem cell therapies. To that end, a team of scientists took their research to new heights by leveraging the International Space Station (ISS) National Laboratory to study microgravity's effects on he

Greenbelt MD (SPX) Oct 20, 2023
NASA's Lucy spacecraft is preparing for its first close-up look at an asteroid. On Nov. 1, it will fly by asteroid Dinkinesh and test its instruments in preparation for visits in the next decade to multiple Trojan asteroids that circle the Sun in the same orbit as Jupiter. Dinkinesh, less than half a mile, or 1 kilometer, wide, circles the Sun in the main belt of asteroids located between