Iowa City, Iowa – An asteroid is approaching the Earth which the experts say will come close enough to be caught in our planet’s gravity well, technically becoming a second moon, at least for a few months. University of Iowa physics and astronomy Professor Casey DeRoo says this asteroid will be captured by the Earth’s gravitational pull around September 29th, it’ll slow down, then go into a sort of U-shaped orbit.
The asteroid known as “2024 PT5” is only about 33 feet in diameter, or about as big across as a school bus. While it will come relatively close to Earth, close in astronomical terms, DeRoo says there’s no chance the asteroid will hit us.
If you’re hoping to catch a glimpse of this wandering space rock, you’re wishing on the wrong star, because even though it’ll be in our orbit, it’ll still be many tens of millions of miles away.
By that, he means a two- to three-foot diameter lens would be needed. The experts say the asteroid will slingshot out of orbit around November 25th, after about 56 days as our looming moon. Where did it come from? There are various theories. DeRoo says it could have been created many millennia ago when the Earth and Moon first separated, or it may have fallen out of the asteroid belt that hovers between Mars and Jupiter. We’ll likely never know for sure.
The approaching asteroid will be extremely tiny, compared to the Moon. (NASA photo)
