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A chunk of space rock that visited near Earth's orbit last year was widely called a "mini-moon," a nickname that was more ...

For a brief, but exciting, time last year, Earth had two moons. A small asteroid lingered close to our planet in its orbit around the Sun, temporarily caught by Earth’s gravity to become a far away ...

Unlike other common asteroids, 2024 PT5 has an orbit close to Earth, and it therefore possibly could be brought from Earth itself or from the Moon. It was not gravitationally captured by Earth but ...

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By Becky Ferreira For a few months last fall, a school-bus-size space rock named 2024 PT5 gained fame as Earth’s new “mini-moon.” Astronomers rushed to study the object while it was still ...

A small space rock that lingered near Earth last year and was referred to as its temporary “mini-moon” may actually be a chunk of the moon that chipped off thousands of years ago. The celestial ...

were already observing the object before anyone dubbed it a potential mini-moon. To ensure that 2024 PT5 wasn’t a hunk of space debris, like an old rocket, which can also be found in an ...

Using the Lowell Discovery Telescope in Arizona and NASA’s Infrared Telescope Facility in Hawaii, scientists analyzed 2024 PT5’s surface and discovered that the mini-moon reflects light almost ...