Earth to Temporarily Acquire a 'Second Moon,' Scientists Say
Earth will welcome a visitor in a few days as a traveling asteroid is expected to spend almost two months revolving around the planet.
The so-called “mini-moon” will be around from Sept. 29 to Nov. 25, according to CBS.
Researchers at the Asteroid Terrestrial-impact Last Alert System, which is funded by NASA, spotted the asteroid and christened it 2024 PT5, which will have a 57-day orbit.
The asteroid will be near Earth even after it stops orbiting, paying its closest call on Jan. 9 before going its own way.
Asteroids and mini-moons have been around before. One asteroid hung about for a few years before departing in 2020; another made pit stops around Earth in 1981 and 2022 and will make another call in 2051.
The mini-moon will be temporarily pulled by Earth’s gravity into orbit before eventually pulling free to rotate around the sun again in its travels
“The object that is going to pay us a visit belongs to the Arjuna asteroid belt, a secondary asteroid belt made of space rocks that follow orbits very similar to that of Earth at an average distance to the sun of about 93 million miles,” said Universidad Complutense de Madrid professor Carlos de la Fuente Marcos, the lead researcher on the team that found the object, according to Space.com, which referred to the object as a “second moon.”
“Objects in the Arjuna asteroid belt are part of the near-Earth object population of asteroids and comets,” he said.
Marcos said objects can get as close as 2.8 million miles away and slow down to speeds of 2,200 miles per hour.
“Under these conditions, the geocentric energy of the object may grow negative, and the object may become a temporary moon of Earth. This particular object will undergo this process starting next week and for about two months,” he added. “It will not follow a full orbit around Earth.“
The average person cannot see the object, he said.
“The object is too small and dim for typical amateur telescopes and binoculars. However, the object is well within the brightness range of typical telescopes used by professional astronomers,” Marcos said. “A telescope with a diameter of at least 30 inches plus a CCD or CMOS detector are needed to observe this object, a 30 inches telescope and a human eye behind it will not be enough.”
“You may say that if a true satellite is like a customer buying goods inside a store, objects like 2024 PT5 are window shoppers,” he said.
Asteroids often wander by Earth, Derek Richardson, an astronomy professor at the University of Maryland said, according to The Washington Post.
“Captures like this must occur frequently. They are just hard to detect,” he said.
“To become a stable moon orbiting us, the object would need to lose a lot more speed,” Richardson said, which would only happen if some massive body in space forces it to lose speed.
“The dance will only last a little while,” he said.
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