SpaceX Launches ESA Hera Towards Asteroid System Didymos

Ever the masters of threading the weather needle, SpaceX sent a Falcon 9 on its way to orbit and the Hera probe on its way to the Didymos binary asteroid system that was impacted by NASA’s DART probe on September 26, 2022.

Today’s flight was the first Falcon 9 to fly since the Crew 9 second-stage anomaly. The flight was licensed by the FAA because the second stage is not planned to reenter Earth’s atmosphere, making the question of public safety moot.

Rain threatened to interfere with the planned launch all morning, with steady rains falling and steely gray overcast skies in the Space Coast region. With only twenty-odd minutes to liftoff, a misty drizzle fell in the region of Space Launch Complex 40. Skies lifted just in time, however, allowing SpaceX to once again beat the weather odds on a day where it looked like that was the least likely outcome.

Perhaps Jessica Jensen, Vice President, Customer Operations and Integration of SpaceX put it best when she said on X.com that “SpaceX has a motto to “never give up a day” no matter how many constraints are against us.” They didn’t, and the launch went right on schedule.

Liftoff and ascent appeared nominal throughout, with Falcon 9 entering the clouds only seconds after launching. Booster B1061 completed its 23rd and final mission successfully, and the second stage of Falcon 9 appeared to be in excellent working order throughout its part of the mission. A little more than one hour and fifteen minutes after launching, SpaceX successfully completed their portion of this mission when the Hera probe was deployed.