Tuesday, September 5, 2017

Florence has moons


I remember the first time it was discovered that an asteroid had moons, when a review of Galileo data indicated that Ida, which Galileo had flown by, had a little companion moon that was subsequently named Dactyl.  I don't think anyone was really surprised that asteroids had moons, as there are so many little chunks of rock in the belt that it's not a shock a little chunk got gravitationally bound to a much bigger one.

So, when asteroid Florence came close by Earth a few days ago, a relatively routine radar scanning observation program revealed that Florence has not just one, but two little rocky companions.  Which means that there are probably hundreds of asteroids with mini-moons, even if we can't see them.

Read about it here:

Close Encounter by the [Big!] Asteroid Florence

And here's a radar image of the big one and the little ones along for the orbital ride.



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