For an hour, HERA flew as close as 5,600 kilometers from the Martian surface, at a speed of 33,480 kilometers an hour. It used the opportunity to test some of its scientific instruments, snapping around 600 pictures, including rare ones of Deimos.

The Hera probe has swung around Mars, using the planet’s gravitational pull to fling itself toward its asteroid target. During its brief rendezvous with the Red Planet, Hera caught a glimpse of the less-seen side of Mars’ smaller, tidally-locked moon as it orbited its home planet.

On the way to investigate the scene of a historic asteroid collision, a European spacecraft swung by Mars and captured rare images of the red planet's mysterious small moon Deimos, the European Space Agency (ESA) said Thursday.