383E-419-ET's Cigar

In 2012 as it crossed the orbit of Neptune heading towards the Sun a small space rock was 250 times fainter than can be detected by the Hubble Space Telescope. Five years later, after it had rounded the Sun, it became visible in asteroid hunter's telescopes for about 16 days, as it streaked across our planet's orbit at 37 miles per second, as it continued to move away from the Sun. During that brief period of time it was discovered by the PanSTARRS group in Hawaii, tracked by telescopes around the world, and given the name Oumuamua (“Oh-moo-ah-moo-ah”). Turns out that previous to the discovery observations, sightings too sparse to report, were obtained by my team using the Catalina Sky Survey's Schmidt telescope on Mt. Bigelow, Arizona. In 2024 this unusual space rock will cross Pluto's average distance from the Sun traveling on a path which will take it into deep interstellar space. Since we don't know how Oumuamua could obtained it's current trajectory from processes in our solar system, it is safe to presume that it originated in truly deep space. The mystery of Oumuamua deepened when astronomers measured it's brightness to change regularly by nearly 10 times over a 7.3 hour period of time. If these brightness variations are due to it's shape, and thus the amount of sun light reflected as it rotates, Oumuamua looks like a cigar. Even though Elon Musk's SpaceX Mars rocket could catch Oumuamua, it is more cost effective is to simply wait to discover another one of the several interstellar asteroids which pass by us each year.

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918-Auroras from Space

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25 Syys 2min

407E-448-Two PHA's

The large dangerous asteroids that we don't know about are what keep asteroid hunters going to the telescope.

22 Syys 2min

917-Space Dust

As the Earth orbits the Sun at 18.5 mi/s it sweeps up about 100 tons of micrometeorites and space dust every day of which some 14 tons eventually makes it to the ground. You can even find some of thes...

18 Syys 2min

406E-447-Nuking An Asteroid

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15 Syys 2min

916-Past Glory

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11 Syys 2min

405E-446-Asteroid Homestead

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8 Syys 2min

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4 Syys 2min