NEAR Shoemaker was the NASA mission that carried the first spacecraft to orbit an asteroid, entering orbit around Eros in 2000.
The Near Earth Asteroid Rendezvous spacecraft launched in 1996 and flew past asteroid Mathilde in 1997. After an Earth gravity assist, it reached the near-Earth asteroid 433 Eros and entered orbit on February 14, 2000.
NEAR Shoemaker studied Eros’s shape, surface composition, geology, mass, and magnetic properties. The spacecraft was later renamed for planetary scientist Eugene Shoemaker. In February 2001, it descended to the asteroid’s surface in an extended mission, returning additional scientific data even though it was not originally designed as a lander.
NEAR Shoemaker is distinct from Dawn, which later orbited Vesta and Ceres, and OSIRIS-REx, which collected material from Bennu and returned it to Earth.