It’s called 2024 PT₅, a small asteroid, though scientists often refer to it as a “mini-moon” in this case.
Measuring around 10 meters in diameter, it poses no threat to Earth, even if it were on a collision course, as it would burn up in the atmosphere. On Sunday, September 29th, it will approach Earth from deep space, orbit our planet once, and then continue its journey through the Solar System on November 25th, after 53 days.
This phenomenon is not particularly rare. Earth regularly attracts objects from space—some are pulled in and burn up in the atmosphere, while others simply have their path bent by Earth’s gravity and continue on. Occasionally, some asteroids become temporary satellites.
For instance:
- In 2006, asteroid 2006 RH120 orbited Earth for about a year.
- Asteroid 2020 CD3 stayed with us for several years until it left in 2020.
- Asteroid 2022 NX1 orbited Earth in 1981, returned in 2022, and will be back in 2051.
Asteroid 2024 PT₅ was discovered on August 7th by the Asteroid Terrestrial-Impact Last Alert System. Researchers Carlos de la Fuente Marcos and Raúl de la Fuente Marcos from Universidad Complutense de Madrid reported their findings in the Research Notes of the AAS.
Scientists describe the asteroid’s path during its “mini-moon episode” as an elongated horseshoe. It will pass Earth at a speed of approximately 1 km/s, with its closest approach being 0.012 astronomical units (AU). For context, one AU is the distance between the Earth and the Sun, about 149,597,870 kilometers. The Moon, by comparison, is about 0.0026 AU away from Earth.
