SCI/TECH: New 'moon' found around Earth

An amateur astronomer may have found another moon of the Earth. Experts say it may have only just arrived.
Much uncertainty surrounds the mysterious object, designated J002E3. It could be a passing chunk of rock captured by the Earth's gravity, or it could be a discarded rocket casing coming back to our region of space.



news.bbc.co.uk...

[Edited on 1-1-2004 by SkepticOverlord]

Neat stuff. I can't wait to find out what it is. I doubt it is space junk since they track things down to the size of bolts when it comes to space junk. Though I doubt everything different government sent up got put down on the logs.

cool
I did'nt even know about the second one,Cuithne

Yeah I saw the article and I was like WTF!!

Its a cool discovery.

OMG it planet X.

It can't be that big, if it was a large rock/meteor wouldn't we be able to see it at night?

Of course it could be the aliens mother ship!

Good find though

HANG on, this isn't new. The date of that report is september 2002!!

[Edited on 1-1-2004 by Britman]

Originally posted by Britman

Of course it could be the aliens mother ship!

That would be awesome! Unless it came to destroy us.... that would suck.

Originally posted by Britman
OMG it planet X.

It can't be that big, if it was a large rock/meteor wouldn't we be able to see it at night?

[Edited on 1-1-2004 by Britman]

With a good set of eyes you can see the space station, but only cause it is very reflective.

Most space junk and space rocks aren't reflective so you can't see them.

As for any "moons" we have other that THE Moon, i'd hardly count them as more than natural space junk. They have null effects on the earth and the atmosphere would make quick work of them if they dropped outta orbit.

But, by deffinition, they are natural satalites and i guess i have to accept them.

OK, there are several annual meteor showers that happen around the Earth. I've heard about a "New Moon" which starts to orbit the Earth almost annually. I feel that this is nothing more than a large meteor that will pass shortly. The tides haven't changed so, that's all it is going to be classified as anyways (a large meteor), and, that's all I think it is.

Feel free to discount my opinion though, I'm drunk!

There are supposed to be several motherships out there are they actually seeing them now?

But the report is over a year old. It's from 2002.

Hrm, I actually think I vaguely remember this. If its the one I'm thinking of it turned out to be a booster from one of the Apollo missions or somesuch.

It could very well be planet X...i read somewhere that the planet absorbs light instead of reflects it...this could be why we think it is a Moon, becuase it reflects less than what the sun puts out.

Originally posted by THENEO
There are supposed to be several motherships out there are they actually seeing them now?

I doubt it. If there were huge motherships out around the Earth then out of the thousands of amateur astronomers out there, one of them would've seen them by now.

Yeah just google for J002E3

The object is most likely a S-IVB from either Apollo 8, 10, 11, or 12, with Apollo 12 being most likely, the researchers conclude.

www.space.com...
www.space.com...

Additionally, the calculations show that J002E3 may have been especially close to Earth in the late 1960s or early 1970s. This made scientists wonder whether J002E3 might be leftovers from the Apollo program.

www.astronomy.com...

Old news sorry guys.

It may be old news, but it seems the majority of us were not aware the Earth had a second moon (Cruithne). For something that's near 3 miles long and roughly 40 moon lengths away..how has it remained un-news-worthy since 1986?!!

great...the motherships here

The reason is because Cruithne is not a moon of earth, as unlike Luna, it is not gravitationally locked ot Earth, ie it does not orbit us. It is merely a near earth asteroid that orbits the sun at almost the same rate the earth does, its closest point of approach is 0.1AU, but it gets a lot further away.

There are two or three other Near-Earth asteroids that have similar orbits.

they explain everything away with discarded boosters, at this rate they are going to out number the amount of boosters ever made, i wonder what the next excuse will be