Earth has captured a new mini-moon (for two months)

September 29, 2024 - Earth has a new “second moon” in the form of asteroid 2024 PT5 which has been caught by our gravitational pull and will make a captured flyby of the planet for 57 days.

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Earth has a new celestial neighbour, albeit one that is only with us for a few weeks.

Dubbed a “second moon”, asteroid 2024 PT5 is currently making a close pass of our planet and will become classed as a mini-moon on September 29, 2024.

The asteroid has a diameter of 10 metres – about the length of a bus – and hails from the Arjuna asteroid belt which follows an orbit quite similar to Earth’s.

2024 PT5 will not complete a full revolution of the planet, so is considered a temporarily captured “flyby” as opposed to a temporarily captured “orbiter”.

After 56.6 days in orbit around the Earth, it will return to a heliocentric orbit around the sun – not returning to us again until 2055.