The Asteroid That’s a Rocket

A spent rocket upper stage from the Apollo era is returning to Earth. At first 2020 SO appeared to be one of thousands of near-Earth asteroids that NASA tracks as part of its early detection system, but upon closer inspection it turned out to be the upper stage of a Centaur rocket that took a probe to the lunar surface in 1966!

Read the full story here:

The strange story of 2020 SO: How an asteroid turned into rocket junk and the NASA scientist who figured it out

(Image: © NASA/JPL-Caltech) As soon as he saw the data, Paul Chodas knew something was strange about the near-Earth object that had been designated 2020 SO. It should have been just another of the tens of thousands of space rocks that astronomers have spotted breezing through our neighborhood in space.

Don’t forget to view Mars in the eastern sky after twilight, having just passed opposition it will remain prominent for the coming weeks and visible the rest of the year.

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Stay well, and clear skies!