Watch Live As Earth Loses Its Mini-Moon 2020 SO: See It While You Can
On 2/1/21 at 12:49 PM EST
Tonight, you will be able to watch a live stream of an artificial mini-moon as it makes one final close approach to Earth before leaving the orbit of our planet.
The object, known as 2020 SO, is not natural in origin but man-made. In fact, astronomers say it is actually a piece of space junk a rocket part built in the 1960s for a doomed NASA mission.
On February 1, this rocket stage will come very close to our planet, according to astronomer Gianluca Masi from the Virtual Telescope Project (VTP.)
In this photo, a scientist at the European Space Agency's Materials and Electrical Components Laboratory at the ESTEC technical center in the Netherlands works on essential mission work.
The wolf moon, first of 12 full moons in 2021, rises Thursday night. Here s the history behind its name. Elinor Aspegren, USA TODAY
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Sky watchers got a real treat Thursday night as the wolf moon filled the night sky.
Though the Virtual Telescope Project will stream video of the first full moonrise of the year over Rome s skyline, amateur astronomers can watch the sky through the early part of Saturday morning – barring any cloud cover due to winter storms.
The name is attributed to Native Americans noticing that wolves would howl during the winter months, when food was scarce, according to the Old Farmer s Almanac.
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Sputnik International
This strange space object will be leaving Earth’s pull soon: How to watch it live
Updated Jan 29, 2021;
Posted Jan 29, 2021
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When a strange space object was discovered approaching Earth on Sept. 27, 2020, astronomers first thought it was some sort of space rock - a mysterious object headed our way - not on a collision course with Earth. As it turns out, the object was coming close enough to get sucked up by our planet’s gravitational pull.
An EarthSky report said orbit models quickly showed that “both the low speed and trajectory of the approaching object were unusual.” And models showed that “Earth would capture this object – temporarily – as a new mini-moon,” the report said.