From the ALPO list: *************** Thursday, 12 September, 2002, 11:57 GMT 12:57 UK EARTH'S NEW 'MOON' JUST SPACE JUNK By Dr David Whitehouse BBC News Online science editor So, it looks like Earth does not have a new "moon" after all The latest analysis of the mysterious object called J002E3 suggests it could well be a leftover Saturn V rocket component from one of the Apollo lunar missions. The suspicious, fast-moving object was discovered on 3 September by Bill Yeung from his observatory in Arizona, US. Initial orbit calculations indicated that it was only about twice as far away as the Moon, and in orbit around the Earth. At first, astronomers were not sure whether the object was a passing chunk of rock that was captured by the Earth's gravity, or a piece of space junk. Now the mystery may have been solved thanks to a retrospective analysis of its movement through space. The object is most likely from the Apollo 12 mission, launched on 14 November 1969. Returned to sender ... It seems that the object was in orbit around the Sun until April of this year when it was captured by the Earth's gravity. The capture occurred when the object passed near the Earth's L1 Lagrange point, a region of space where the gravity of the Earth and Sun approximately cancel. J002E3 is the first known case of an object being captured by the Earth, although Jupiter has been known to capture comets in the same way. The most recent analysis of J002E3's pre-capture orbit about the Sun shows that it was always inside the Earth's orbit, and that it may have come within the Earth's vicinity in the early 1970s or late 1960s. This suggests that J002E3 was very likely orbiting the Earth during this period before escaping into solar orbit. Experts say that it is likely that this object isthe Apollo Saturn rocket's third stage. The brightness of J002E3 seems to match the expected brightness of such a component. Analysis of J002E3's orbit suggests that there is a chance of it impacting the Moon in 2003, and an outside possibility of it burning up in the Earth's atmosphere sometime in the next decade or so. ****************** Jeff Jeff Hopkins HPO SOFT ********************************************************************* Phoenix, Arizona Atlanta, Georgia 7812 West Clayton Drive 12170 Boxwood Circle Phoenix, AZ 85033-2439 U.S.A. Alpharetta, GA 30005 U.S.A. (623) 849-5889 (Fax) (770) 619-3322 (Phone/Fax) www.hposoft.com & amug.org/~hposoft dataman.home.mindspring.com 4th Dimension Partner FileMaker Pro Expert BASIC/C++ Programmer & Web Site/e-commerce Site Development Over 25 years of Computer, Programming and Database Development Experience -- This message is from the AZ-Observing mailing list. See this message's header if you want info about unsubscribing or the list's archive. This is a discussion list. Please send personal inquiries directly to the message author. In other words, do not use "reply" for personal messages. Thanks.