NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, California announced this month that planet Earth has made a new friend! The near-Earth companion (or “quasi-satellite”) has been designated as 2016 HO3. The asteroid – which plays a game of leapfrog with us as it orbits the sun – is somewhere between 120 feet (40 meters) and 300 feet (100 meters) and never comes closer than 9 million miles (14 million kilometers).

Our calculations indicate 2016 HO3 has been a stable quasi-satellite of Earth for almost a century, and it will continue to follow this pattern as Earth’s companion for centuries to come. Paul Chodas, manager of NASA's Center for Near-Earth Object (NEO) Studies at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory

Asteroid 2016 HO3 was initially observed on April 27, 2016 by the Panoramic Survey Telescope and Rapid Response System (Pan-STARRS) 1 asteroid survey telescope in Haleakala, Hawaii. The Pan-STARRS is operated by the University of Hawaii’s Institute for Astronomy and funded by NASA’s Planetary Defense Coordination Office. If you want to keep updated on it’s movements, NASA has a Twitter feed called AsteroidWatch for all your Near Earth Orbit news needs.

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