The first image of China s rouge Long March 5B rocket in orbit has been released by astronomers.
The Italy-based Virtual Telescope Project captured the craft, which appears like a glowing light, as it passed above the group s Elena robotic telescope.
The Chinese rocket made headlines this week when new surfaced the massive 21-ton vehicle would make an uncontrolled reentry weekend, with the possibility of landing in inhabited areas.
The rocket was moving extremely fast when it soared 435 miles above the Virtual Telescopes Project s telescope Wednesday evening, researchers said.
Gianluca Masi, an astronomer with the Virtual Telescope Project who snapped the image, stated that while the Sun was just a few degrees below the horizon, so the sky was incredibly bright: these conditions made the imaging quite extreme, but our robotic telescope succeeded in capturing this huge debris.
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The Italy-based Virtual Telescope Project snapped the image on Wednesday night using a PlaneWave 17-inch telescope.
The rocket was moving extremely fast, according to the Virtual Telescope Project s founder Gianluca Masi.
The photo can be seen below. At the time, the rocket was around 700 kilometers from Earth.
A photo of the Long March 5B rocket taken by the Virtual Telescope Project.
Gianluca Masi/Virtual Telescope Project
Masi said on the project s website that the photo was captured when the Sun was just below the horizon, so the sky was incredibly bright.
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An asteroid that was discovered less than a week ago is due to pass by Earth on March 16 so closely that it will come between our planet and the moon.
Asteroid 2021 EQ3 was detected by the Mt. Lemmon Survey and reported by the NASA-funded Minor Planet Center on March 11. NASA states its first observations of the asteroid were on March 10.
The space rock is thought to be traveling at 11.99 kilometers per second relative to Earth. This is equal to around 26,800 miles per hour, or 30 times faster than a handgun bullet. It is estimated to be between 52 feet and 121 feet in diameter.
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