A mysterious object in space is heading towards our planet, and although it poses no threat to life, as far as we know, it could latch onto Earth’s orbit and turn into a Mini Moon.
The asteroid is known as 2020 SO among the science community, and if it remains in Earth’s orbit it will become the third known body that spends time orbiting the outskirts of our terrestrial neighborhood.
Should the space rock get hooked on our orbit, 2020 SO will stay with us from October this year to May 2021, and we should, hopefully, be able to see it naturally.
Officially 2020 SO is classified as an asteroid, but there is evidence to suggest that it could actually be a colossal mass of human-generated space debris, and that it has finally returned to our planet after wandering in the vicinity of the Solar System.
Asteroid 2020 SO may get captured by Earth from Oct 2020 – May 2021. Current nominal trajectory shows shows capture through L2, and escape through L1. Highly-chaotic path, so be prepared for lots of revisions as new observations come in. @renerpho @nrco0e https://t.co/h4JaG2rHEd pic.twitter.com/RfUaeLtEWq
— Tony Dunn (@tony873004) September 20, 2020
Scientists believe, as they revealed to ScienceAlert, that 2020 SO is likely to be the discarded Centaur stage of a rocket during the failed launch of Surveyor 2 from the 1966 mission. They commented that the mysterious object is roughly the same size. In addition to that, it is traveling at a speed much less than an asteroid. It’s a gigantic piece of junk, but it’s surprisingly easy to lose sight of in space.
“There are so many factors in the space environment, like gravitational factors and other things that affect movement, that it can sometimes be quite unpredictable,” said one of the researchers.
“You have to keep tracking these things, or you can just sort of lose sight of them really easily. And if they do something a little bit unpredictable, and you look the wrong way, then you don’t know where it’s gone. It is quite astonishing, the number of things that have gone missing.”
The rocket stage hypothesis is the most likely, but if the results of these tests are negative, we could be facing a natural satellite that is moving in a really strange way. Maybe a new interstellar visitor like Oumuamua. We will know more details next month.
After the six months that this Mini Moon will spend with us, it will return to space and continue on its journey.
That's no mini-moon, that's a space station! pic.twitter.com/ZOdhBAHU02
— Douglas Gibbs (@DouglasGibbsIBM) September 22, 2020
