by Kasey Cunningham

On Tuesday November 8, 2011, asteroid 2005 YU55 flew by Earth while being carefully monitored by astronomers throughout its passing. On Earth, the fear was that asteroid 2005 YU55, whose size is comparable to an aircraft carrier, would strike the Earth’s surface. However, astronomers quickly set this rumor to rest. They explained that asteroid passing by is both too small, and moving too quickly to be gravitationally pulled toward the Earth’s surface.

DTM postdoctoral fellow Nick Moskovitz witnessed the asteroid fly-by first hand as head of a spectroscopic campaign he organized to observe the small planetary body.  At times, up to five telescopes from across the country were pointed toward the asteroid. Moskovitz stationed observers at Kitt Peak in Arizona, the Palomar Observatory in California, and on Mauna Kea in Hawaii. DTM staff scientist Scott Sheppard was also part of the observation team.

While some of these facilities had little experience observing an object moving at such high speeds (30,000 miles per hour), this did not stop them from gathering useful data. According to Moskovitz, “All in all I am pleased with how the observations turned out. We have lots of data to analyze now. In the coming weeks we hope to gain insight into the composition and surface properties of this object.”