A Close Encounter with Asteroid 2002 NY40

Caltech astronomers William Reach and Thomas Jarrett and student Naman Bhatt captured near-infrared images of the asteroid 2002 NY40 as it passed close to Earth during the late hours of August 17th (Pacific time zone). The asteroid was acquired and tracked using the Hale 200" telescope of the Palomar Observatory.

Movie Showing Asteroid 2002 NY40 Passing Over Palomar Mountain The movie shows a series of 1-second 2-micron images taken with the Hale 200" telescope of the Palomar Observatory using a near-infrared camera. The streak is the asteroid "2002 NY40" as it passed overhead midnight of August 18, 2002, some 326,000 miles distant (roughly 1.4 times the distance to the moon). The near earth object (NEO) is roughly 1/2 mile in diameter. See the JPL Near Earth Objects Project).

2-Micron Image Showing Asteroid Tracked by Telescope. The asteroid is now being tracked by the telescope, while background stars streak through the field of view in a 1-second exposure.

3-Band Combined Image Showing Asteroid Tracked by Telescope. The asteroid was imaged with three different narrow-band filters centered in the 1.2 micron (blue), 1.6 micron (green) and 2.2 micron (red) windows.

e-mail: Tom Jarrett
e-mail: William Reach