Madrid. A small asteroid is caught in Earth's gravitational pull, so our natural satellite has the company of a mini-moon from Sunday to November 25, although due to distance and its small size it can only be seen with professional telescopes.
The temporary moon is named 2024 PT5, an object discovered on August 7 by telescopes from the ATLAS project in South Africa. Astronomers Carlos and Raul de la Fuente Marcos of the Spanish Complutense University (Madrid) made calculations that concluded that the asteroid would be captured by Earth, which is not the first time this has happened with other similar bodies.
“When its data was made public, we realized that it would pass close to Earth and at a low speed. We made calculations and verified that capture would occur,” Carlos de la Fuente Marcos told EFE.
2024 PT5 is the largest minimoon known so far, ranging in size from 5 to 40 meters, the researcher says, and it will be next to Earth for 56.6 days, after which it will regain its heliocentric path.
According to the latest data from NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) Horizons system, the temporary capture will begin on September 29 and end on November 25.
The object is part of the so-called Arjunus – noted De la Fuente Marcos – which forms the asteroid belt closest to Earth and orbits the Sun at the same distance, shape and angle as our planet. Enjoy minimoon episodes.
The small asteroid may have been ejected from the Moon during an impact that created a crater, as suggested by some data, but infrared spectroscopy is needed to confirm.
“Clearly – he pointed out – this is not an artificial object, space junk. Right now several collaborations are actively looking at this object, and new announcements will certainly be made in the coming weeks.
The new moon has a horseshoe path, “making it easier to catch, but not guaranteed.”
During the nearly two months it will be with our planet, the average separation between the asteroid and Earth will be 0.0250 AU, which is “greater than what separates us from the Moon, so there is no risk of collision.”
Return in 2055
Typically, subjects who experience these episodes repeat them. Thus, 2024 PT5, as the 2022 NX1 asteroid was in 1981 and 2022, “will be a small moon again in 2055 and a small moon in 2084.”
Seizure episodes can be of two types depending on their duration. Short ones are days, weeks or even months and the object does not complete an orbit around the Earth. That is the 2024 PT5 case.
Longer ones can last a year or more, as asteroids 2006 RH120 and 2020 CD3 did.
The short ones “occur relatively frequently, every 2 or 3 years, the long ones every 10, 20 or 30 years. It is not well known because the known population is still small.
De la Fuente Marcos recalled that the 1990s “started with the 1991 VG, which was first considered an alien vessel.”
The biggest interest in 'minimoons' is to visit them at low cost, with the aim of collecting mineral samples that can be analyzed on Earth or for space mining projects.
“This is why it is important to predict when they will occur,” de la Fuente Marcos said.
