AIDA : Asteroid Impact & Deflection Assessment Mission

NASA and the European Space Agency (ESA) originally had separate missions planned to test asteroid deflection strategies. Yet in 2015 they decided to collaborate on one mission called AIDA (Asteroid Impact and Deflection Assessment).

The target was the binary asteroid 65803 Didymos and its satellite moonlet Dimorphos.

AIDA involved two separate spacecraft working together: the European spacecraft AIM (Asteroid Impact Mission); and the American spacecraft DART (Double Asteroid Redirection Test).

AIM would have orbited the larger asteroid Didymos to study its composition and that of its moonlet Dimorphos. DART would then impact Dimorphos during a close approach of the asteroid to Earth.

The AIM orbiter was however cancelled, and replaced by HERA, designed to begin observing the asteroid four years after the DART impact. DART successfully impacted Dimorphos on 26 September 2022. HERA will arrive at Didymos in December 2026.

Show Type

KS3 - KS5 / Adults
Length: 7min