Hera sends back its first close-up view of the Didymos asteroid pair from 60 km away

5 November 2026

The European Space Agency has released the first close-up image returned by its Hera spacecraft of the asteroid Didymos and its small moon Dimorphos.
The picture was taken from 60 km away by Hera's monochromatic Asteroid Framing Camera, after a two-year flight that had carried the spacecraft 196.8 million km from Earth.
Didymos, about 780 m across, is clearly lit, while the 151 m Dimorphos lies mostly in shadow.
The face of Didymos now in view is the side opposite to the one photographed by the DART spacecraft before it struck Dimorphos in September 2022.
The image shows the equatorial ridge seen earlier along with boulders, craters and possible grooves, and scientists suspect some of the material was thrown about 1 km across from Dimorphos by the DART impact.
That 580 kg impactor, striking at about 6.1 km per second, shortened Dimorphos's orbit around Didymos by roughly 33 minutes, making it the first Solar System body whose orbit humans have measurably changed.
ESA says detailed images of both asteroids are due on 25 November.