NASA’s Dawn Spacecraft Approaches Asteroid Vesta
After three and a half years of thrusting silently through the void, NASA’s Dawn spacecraft is on the threshold of a new world. It’s deep in…
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Is Vesta Really an Asteroid?
On March 29, 1807, German astronomer Heinrich Wilhelm Olbers spotted Vesta as a pinprick of light in the sky. Two hundred and four years later, as…
Read the article →Asteroid 2003 UV11 Flyby
Asteroid 2003 UV11 will fly past Earth on Oct. 29th and 30th (2010) at a distance of only 1.2 million miles. Its minimum (closest) approach to…
Read the article →Asteroid 2010 TD54 Flyby
[Update: October 13: Asteroid 2010 TD54 flew within the orbit of the moon on Oct. 11 while astronomers watched to see if the encounter caused any…
Read the article →Rosetta Probe Encounters Asteroid Lutetia
Asteroid Lutetia has been revealed as a battered world of many craters. ESA’s Rosetta mission has returned the first close-up images of the asteroid showing it…
Read the article →Curious Asteroid Flyby on Jan 13th
A curious object is about to fly past Earth only one-third the distance to the Moon. Cataloged as a 10m-class asteroid, 2010 AL30 has an orbital…
Read the article →Asteroid Flyby of 1862 Apollo
May 7, 2007: This week, asteroid 1862 Apollo is flying past Earth. Closest approach: 11 million kilometers on May 8th at 1500 UT. Discovered in 1932,…
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