On September 26, 2022, NASA’s DART spacecraft collided with the asteroid Dimorphos, changing its orbit around its parent asteroid Didymos. The mission will be the first of two spacecraft to visit the binary asteroid system to learn more about how Earth can be protected from asteroids in the event of a potential impact. It was something.
The next mission, involving a spacecraft called Hera built by the European Space Agency (ESA), is scheduled to launch in October. It will use an array of detectors to study the aftermath of the collision and will carry two CubeSats called Juventus and Milani. But before it leaves Earth, Hera must undergo intensive testing at ESA’s European Space Research and Technology Center in the Netherlands to ensure it can handle the rigors of launch and space.
Hera Greus, the mission’s product assurance and safety manager, said the checks will include extreme noise and vibration to simulate launch conditions, as well as heat and heat to face the extreme temperatures and other fluctuations Hera will experience in space. Supervising vacuum testing. If passed, Greus would be the last person to sign on for the spacecraft’s launch. But she says there are always surprises in every launch campaign.
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