The Space Stuff thread

Nice read, it is a moment of wonder and amazing to me that the Voyagers are still productive after 43years and 11.5billion miles.

Look up toward the sky and wave hello to Earth’s new mini moon -- even if you can’t see it.

Our planet temporarily gained an additional, natural moon when a small asteroid was pulled into Earth’s orbit three years ago, the International Astronomical Union’s Minor Planet Center (MPC) announced late Tuesday.

The asteroid, lyrically named 2020 CD3, is estimated to be about 6 to 12 feet in diameter.

Multiple observations of the “temporarily captured object” are documented in a new Minor Planet Electronic Circular published by the MPC. The post indicates that the object is “temporarily bound to the Earth.”

Source

Click on tweet and scroll down four to see astro-photo:

Tweet

— Twitter API (@user) View on Twitter

Orbit and Gravity are the same: GravitySimulator by Tony Dunn

Minor Planet Electronic Circular

Thanks Bill, yea that's surprising, Elon's usually into everything.

Forget the tweet instructions, to see the darn moonlet go to: Catalina Sky Survey Discovers New Mini-Moon Orbiting Earth to see the whole article and scroll down abit to see an animation of its travels.

Or try: Moonlet animation

I can find the animation on twitter but when I try to tweet it here the link says there is no such animal. SMH...