Uploaded March 2025 | Updated September 2026, 1 week ago
The tiny (16 x 12 x 10 km) moon Deimos crosses the face of Mars as seen by the ESA spacecraft Hera on March 12, 2025. As Hera swung past the planet to gain enough energy to meet up with its ultimate target (the binary asteroid Didymos and Dimorphos) it flew within 300 km of Deimos, and took images from as close as 1,000 km. These still images were then strung together to make this animation (which repeats twice). The images were taken by Hera's Thermal Infrared Imager, which will be used to measure the temperature of the asteroids' surfaces. Hera will reach the binary in December 2026.
Credit: ESA/JAXA
Oriignal animation (rotated here for a better astpect ratio): https://www.esa.int/Space_Safety/Hera/Hera_asteroid_mission_spies_Mars_s_Deimos_moon
The tiny (16 x 12 x 10 km) moon Deimos crosses the face of Mars as seen by the ESA spacecraft Hera on March 12, 2025. As Hera swung past the planet to gain enough energy to meet up with its ultimate target (the binary asteroid Didymos and Dimorphos) it flew within 300 km of Deimos, and took images from as close as 1,000 km. These still images were then strung together to make this animation (which repeats twice). The images were taken by Hera's Thermal Infrared Imager, which will be used to measure the temperature of the asteroids' surfaces. Hera will reach the binary in December 2026.
Credit: ESA/JAXA
Oriignal animation (rotated here for a better astpect ratio): https://www.esa.int/Space_Safety/Hera/Hera_asteroid_mission_spies_Mars_s_Deimos_moon
