Astronomers delete asteroid because it turned out to be Tesla Roadster(astronomy.com)
astronomy.com
Astronomers delete asteroid because it turned out to be Tesla Roadster
https://www.astronomy.com/science/astronomers-just-deleted-an-asteroid-because-it-turned-out-to-be-elon-musks-tesla-roadster/
101 comments
It is being tracked under the correct designation “2018-017A”, therefore they are deleting an erroneous report that was temporarily assigned the designation that was deleted. What makes you think they “stopped tracking” it?
The headline says "delete" not "correct" or "replace". Blame clickbait.
Agreed, if the title were "Astronomers reclassified asteroid..." there's barely any reason to click on it.
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The headline correctly says they deleted an asteroid because it wasn’t an asteroid.
That says nothing about whether or not they continued tracking the object as “not an asteroid”.
That says nothing about whether or not they continued tracking the object as “not an asteroid”.
Neither of your suggestions are accurate. The headline is accurate.
Given overwhelming recent experience, I highly doubt it. I think I didn’t have gray hair the last time a title was more accurate than the story.
It's not that the headline is "more accurate" than the story, it's that the headline is accurate and reflects the content of the article. If you look at the second paragraph of the article, as well as the source it provides[0], they all agree the "asteroid" was deleted from records: "EDITORIAL NOTICE: DELETION OF 2018 CN41". It was not reclassified or corrected, it was deleted, because it was not an asteroid and so does not belong in the list of designated asteroids. It just also happens to already be tracked elsewhere.
[0] https://minorplanetcenter.net/mpec/K25/K25A49.html
[0] https://minorplanetcenter.net/mpec/K25/K25A49.html
I'll bite, that sounds like a correction to me.
Maybe in the broadest sense, but it's certainly not more accurate to say that. If I hold a fiction writing competition, and you submit a piece of non-fiction that I throw in a paper shredder, I think most would agree that I would be misleading if I said I "corrected" your writing. "Deleted" would be a better description, regardless of whether the same work had been submitted elsewhere before.
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OK. But it seems like something is amiss if this error keeps being made. Why didn't the reporting astronomer, or anyone who presumably checked the submission, find the 2018-017A object when searching for it in their database?
Because their software, sat_id can only search Earth-orbiting satellites:
> Payne noted that when the Tesla Roadster was originally launched in 2018, the community caught it and flagged it as an artificial object, and the MPC “correctly labeled it as such without assigning a minor planet designation.”
But when subsequent observations were archived by the MPC and later identified by G., sat_id failed to locate the Roadster, said Payne. And the object was not caught upon further review because unlike most satellites, it orbits the Sun and not Earth. In addition, it is an unusual Sun-centric orbit for a spacecraft. Because it was a test flight for the Falcon Heavy, there was no destination in particular; that is why its trajectory originates near Earth but overshoots Mars’ orbit, as G. noted.
As the article mentioned, there is no such thing as space-track.org or celestrak.org where anyone can get trajectories for all deep space spacecraft. The closest thing we have is JPL Horizons, so they're working with them:
> Payne agreed that a central repository, “regularly updated by national and private space agencies, would significantly enhance the identification process.” Currently, he said, the MPC is collaborating with JPL on a system to better detect artificial objects that aren’t in Earth orbit and filter them out of the MPC’s observational database.
> Payne noted that when the Tesla Roadster was originally launched in 2018, the community caught it and flagged it as an artificial object, and the MPC “correctly labeled it as such without assigning a minor planet designation.”
But when subsequent observations were archived by the MPC and later identified by G., sat_id failed to locate the Roadster, said Payne. And the object was not caught upon further review because unlike most satellites, it orbits the Sun and not Earth. In addition, it is an unusual Sun-centric orbit for a spacecraft. Because it was a test flight for the Falcon Heavy, there was no destination in particular; that is why its trajectory originates near Earth but overshoots Mars’ orbit, as G. noted.
As the article mentioned, there is no such thing as space-track.org or celestrak.org where anyone can get trajectories for all deep space spacecraft. The closest thing we have is JPL Horizons, so they're working with them:
> Payne agreed that a central repository, “regularly updated by national and private space agencies, would significantly enhance the identification process.” Currently, he said, the MPC is collaborating with JPL on a system to better detect artificial objects that aren’t in Earth orbit and filter them out of the MPC’s observational database.
> As the article mentioned, there is no such thing as space-track.org or celestrak.org where anyone can get trajectories for all deep space spacecraft. The closest thing we have is JPL Horizons, so they're working with them:
That seems like something that's worth fixing as more and more artificial objects get launched into deep space.
That seems like something that's worth fixing as more and more artificial objects get launched into deep space.
This should be an international effort, not just US! They will censor out their spy satellites, even if its accidentally taken by a sky survey telescope: https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/technology/when-a-telescope-i...
Then other countries can use this as an excuse to not go public with their spacecraft ephemerides (US didn't tell the world about all of their spacecrafts, so why should I do that?)
Then other countries can use this as an excuse to not go public with their spacecraft ephemerides (US didn't tell the world about all of their spacecrafts, so why should I do that?)
Sure - but they didn't even mention the US.
Damn right! I was actually surprised to learn there is no such thing yet; I'd expect some space agency would be hosting some frontend to a database collectively maintained by various space agencies and adjacent organizations.
Nevertheless, great to see they're working on it now!
Nevertheless, great to see they're working on it now!
Yeah, there have also been some other odd historical objects like [https://www.astronomy.com/space-exploration/how-a-long-gone-...]
In that case they figured out what it was when a spectrograph of the surface light showed it was - painted! Hah.
In that case they figured out what it was when a spectrograph of the surface light showed it was - painted! Hah.
> In that case they figured out what it was when a spectrograph of the surface light showed it was - painted! Hah.
Good they caught it now, though I figured all the paint has long been eaten away by UV rays.
Good they caught it now, though I figured all the paint has long been eaten away by UV rays.
In some of the other cases listed in the article such as 1966-084B (2020 SO) the position was unknown until they found it and as such no central database could have helped them, but it's unclear why Horizons would not help with the Roadster given they could query it with the observed position.
It's being tracked, but not by the "Minor Planet Center".
Hopefully it still is being tracked by them, otherwise when someone reports it tomorrow they'll have no idea what it is and will need to go through this song and dance again.
It's just not being published on a certain curated list by the MPC.
It's just not being published on a certain curated list by the MPC.
By who? They say there doesn't exist a database tracking things like this:
>“This incident, along with previous NEOCP postings of the WMAP spacecraft, highlights the deplorable state of availability of positional information on distant artificial objects,” the MPC fumed when it retracted 2007 VN84. “A single source for information on all distant artificial objects would be very desirable.”
>“This incident, along with previous NEOCP postings of the WMAP spacecraft, highlights the deplorable state of availability of positional information on distant artificial objects,” the MPC fumed when it retracted 2007 VN84. “A single source for information on all distant artificial objects would be very desirable.”
The ID they use is from a US government database: https://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/nmc/spacecraft/display.action?id...
I'm not sure if it was the lack of trajectories or the unusual orbit which caused the automation issue at MPC.
I'm not sure if it was the lack of trajectories or the unusual orbit which caused the automation issue at MPC.
> The Minor Planet Electronic Circulars contain information on unusual minor planets, routine data on comets and natural satellites, and occasional editorial announcements.
I assume it's being tracked elsewhere. But not here.
I assume it's being tracked elsewhere. But not here.
You should probably read the article first before you make assumptive comments like this.
I'm not sure I buy into the sensationalism behind this story. We're tracking billions[0] of asteroids in interplanetary space, and you say that it's a data-processing hazard that the half-dozen or so deep-space anthropogenic objects aren't submitted to a mandatory international database for de-confliction? That doesn't pass the smell test.
[0] https://www.technologyreview.com/2025/01/01/1108643/vera-c-r...
[0] https://www.technologyreview.com/2025/01/01/1108643/vera-c-r...
> I'm not sure I buy into the sensationalism behind this story
It does seem odd there is an entire article about a single mislabeled-and-then-caught object in a large database that probably has many mislabeled objects that have never been caught.
The position of the object is well documented [1] [2]. It surprises me that there are not some very basic checks done on new objects against other databases.
All that said, I do feel for astronomers, the crazy tempo of rocket launches and satellites makes their job a lot harder and its only going to get harder still but maybe offset by Super Heavy enabling larger and cheaper space telescopes.
[1] https://theskylive.com/roadster-info
[2] https://where-is-tesla-roadster.space/live
It does seem odd there is an entire article about a single mislabeled-and-then-caught object in a large database that probably has many mislabeled objects that have never been caught.
The position of the object is well documented [1] [2]. It surprises me that there are not some very basic checks done on new objects against other databases.
All that said, I do feel for astronomers, the crazy tempo of rocket launches and satellites makes their job a lot harder and its only going to get harder still but maybe offset by Super Heavy enabling larger and cheaper space telescopes.
[1] https://theskylive.com/roadster-info
[2] https://where-is-tesla-roadster.space/live
There’s not a lot of man made objects floating in deep space. DeltaV to get outside earths gravity well is just extremely high.
There's at least 72 according to [1], which does not include upper stages from unmanned missions. You could likely query all of them that have been found from Horizons, but I don't know how to do so off the top of my head.
[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_artificial_objects_in_...
[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_artificial_objects_in_...
> It surprises me that there are not some very basic checks done on new objects against other databases.
Hopefully it will be now. Maybe, like with many human endeavors, it kind of fell through the cracks, with everyone independently thinking it's someone else's responsibility and not communicating, until some journalist found out and forced everyone to communicate about it.
Hopefully it will be now. Maybe, like with many human endeavors, it kind of fell through the cracks, with everyone independently thinking it's someone else's responsibility and not communicating, until some journalist found out and forced everyone to communicate about it.
This is not the first time it has happened and often they are mistakenly classified as NEOs.
https://x.com/planet4589/status/1638916566644576259
https://x.com/planet4589/status/1638916566644576259
> mistakenly classified as NEOs.
Is it not an Object that approaches to Near the Earth?
Is it not an Object that approaches to Near the Earth?
That's not how definitions work. The IAU defines what "NEO" means and it excludes artificial objects: https://www.iau.org/public/themes/neo/
You may complain that you should be able to derive the definition from the name, but then all names would be as long as their definition, defeating the purpose.
You may complain that you should be able to derive the definition from the name, but then all names would be as long as their definition, defeating the purpose.
I think the issue is that there isn't such a "mandatory international database for de-confliction."
> We're tracking billions[0] of asteroids
This is exaggeration. Really, this type of astronomy is very underfunded, so we're just approach state, when will track just most dangerous objects, which number is just about thousand, just because of budget limitation.
This is exaggeration. Really, this type of astronomy is very underfunded, so we're just approach state, when will track just most dangerous objects, which number is just about thousand, just because of budget limitation.
There are only a little over a million known asteroids. The link you provided is saying that the Vera Rubin Observatory is expected to find billions of galaxies, and says nothing about how many asteroids it is expected to find.
https://catalina.lpl.arizona.edu/faq/how-many-asteroids-are-...
https://catalina.lpl.arizona.edu/faq/how-many-asteroids-are-...
>I'm not sure I buy into the sensationalism behind this story.
Agreed - Elon gets clicks especially given his recent "involvement" with the US government.
Agreed - Elon gets clicks especially given his recent "involvement" with the US government.
When you, as a lobbyist and supplier, are getting an office built for you in the white house, that's a little bit closer than being 'involved'.
Honestly "astronomers" have really started to annoy me, which surprises me because I love space and astronomy and star-gazing and such. I have bought multiple personal telescopes over the years, so I guess I even qualify as an amateur astronomer. But lately it seems I disagree with astronomers on any intersection of astronomy and politics. I put "astronomers" in quotes because of course I realize that "not all astronomers", but the consensus does seem to be there.
> Satellite internet constellations that provide affordable internet to millions of people bad because it might hurt terrrestrial astronomy.
> Infrastructure projects should not be built in sites that are good for astronomy because astronomy is apparently more important than energy and resource production[1].
> Much ado about nothing because some amateur astronomers thought a Tesla Roadster was an asteroid. Implications that companies are irresonsible / direlict in their duty for not ensuring that astronomers are well-informed.
Just overall I've been getting the feeling over the last couple years that "astronomers" have a severely inflated sense of self-importance. Or maybe I am the problem and I am under-valuing astronomy (or over-valuing everything else).
[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42668953
> Satellite internet constellations that provide affordable internet to millions of people bad because it might hurt terrrestrial astronomy.
> Infrastructure projects should not be built in sites that are good for astronomy because astronomy is apparently more important than energy and resource production[1].
> Much ado about nothing because some amateur astronomers thought a Tesla Roadster was an asteroid. Implications that companies are irresonsible / direlict in their duty for not ensuring that astronomers are well-informed.
Just overall I've been getting the feeling over the last couple years that "astronomers" have a severely inflated sense of self-importance. Or maybe I am the problem and I am under-valuing astronomy (or over-valuing everything else).
[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42668953
I had the same feelings as you.
I feel like serious issues are being brought up but there is also a bit too much righteousness attached to it rather than just pragmatic concerns. Maybe it's just the news reporter adding it though. News always want to add drama and specialty even to mundane events that might be solved easily. Sometimes throwing the discordia apple onto the dinner table.
In this case it seems it was just a mistake recognizing human made objects as asteroids. They mentioned it happened with Tesla Roster and also the Rosetta spacecraft. So yeah, it's pretty boring and the solution is very obvious. Have/improve a shared database of outer space objects.
Now I don't know if the journalist or some astronomer or someone else added the part with *A ’deplorable’ problem*
The definition of deplorable: "deserving strong condemnation; completely unacceptable" "children living in deplorable conditions"
Is this really a 'deplorable' problem? I really don't think there is any need to use such shaming and guilty oriented words for such a small matter. The amount of righteousness is just too much. It will cause people that would on the same side as you with just slightly different jobs/opinions to feel attacked and diminished. In my opinion this is what caused all big tech to flip from democrats to republicans. People over critized tech companies, painted them as villains. Everyone is just trying to do the best they can. It's better to be constructive, offer help, empathy, ask questions, dial back the righteousness. This way people don't feel attacked and punished but rather inspired to do better together.
I feel like serious issues are being brought up but there is also a bit too much righteousness attached to it rather than just pragmatic concerns. Maybe it's just the news reporter adding it though. News always want to add drama and specialty even to mundane events that might be solved easily. Sometimes throwing the discordia apple onto the dinner table.
In this case it seems it was just a mistake recognizing human made objects as asteroids. They mentioned it happened with Tesla Roster and also the Rosetta spacecraft. So yeah, it's pretty boring and the solution is very obvious. Have/improve a shared database of outer space objects.
Now I don't know if the journalist or some astronomer or someone else added the part with *A ’deplorable’ problem*
The definition of deplorable: "deserving strong condemnation; completely unacceptable" "children living in deplorable conditions"
Is this really a 'deplorable' problem? I really don't think there is any need to use such shaming and guilty oriented words for such a small matter. The amount of righteousness is just too much. It will cause people that would on the same side as you with just slightly different jobs/opinions to feel attacked and diminished. In my opinion this is what caused all big tech to flip from democrats to republicans. People over critized tech companies, painted them as villains. Everyone is just trying to do the best they can. It's better to be constructive, offer help, empathy, ask questions, dial back the righteousness. This way people don't feel attacked and punished but rather inspired to do better together.
it’s cheaper and more permanent to just lay fibre and copper to provide internet. we don’t need 3000 satellites launched every few years to do so.
i think you’re overinflating elon’s importance. (not that he designs and builds starlink, anyway)
i think you’re overinflating elon’s importance. (not that he designs and builds starlink, anyway)
Apparently we do, otherwise there wouldn’t be a bunch of people for whom satellite internet is the only option.
Not to mention the difficulty of running fiber or copper to ships and airplanes.
Not to mention the difficulty of running fiber or copper to ships and airplanes.
As my other message. I feel here the journalist (or someone else) like the godness Discordia just threw a golden Apple onto the table with written "To the best solution".
The result will be confusion, arguing, zero sum game thinking.
Yes, fibre optic is faster, yes it's cheaper. Yes I have it in my home. Yes I'm your friend. We are the same, we are all in the same boat. There are special uses for Starlink too. It can help countries where inneficient/corrupt governments/telcos create monopolies and don't want to provide fibre. Starlink will force all telcos to be at either faster or cheaper than Starlink. Healthy competition will make everything better. I will still use my FTTH 1Gbps fibre optic which is 3 times cheaper than Starlink at my own house. But I have a Starlink antenna as a backup, once a camion ripped the fibre optic cable (hanging from poles in my neighborhood) and I would have been 1 month without connection if it wasn't for Starlink. I use Starlink at the summer houses of my families, in the long run it's cheaper than paying DSL for 12 months since you can cancel Starlink whenever we can. We are all on the same boat, this beautiful planet called Earth, let's preserve it, but also, let's keep building awesome stuff, there is no limit to awesomeness.
The result will be confusion, arguing, zero sum game thinking.
Yes, fibre optic is faster, yes it's cheaper. Yes I have it in my home. Yes I'm your friend. We are the same, we are all in the same boat. There are special uses for Starlink too. It can help countries where inneficient/corrupt governments/telcos create monopolies and don't want to provide fibre. Starlink will force all telcos to be at either faster or cheaper than Starlink. Healthy competition will make everything better. I will still use my FTTH 1Gbps fibre optic which is 3 times cheaper than Starlink at my own house. But I have a Starlink antenna as a backup, once a camion ripped the fibre optic cable (hanging from poles in my neighborhood) and I would have been 1 month without connection if it wasn't for Starlink. I use Starlink at the summer houses of my families, in the long run it's cheaper than paying DSL for 12 months since you can cancel Starlink whenever we can. We are all on the same boat, this beautiful planet called Earth, let's preserve it, but also, let's keep building awesome stuff, there is no limit to awesomeness.
If it’s better then why wasn’t it done?
You underestimate the difficulty of navigating lawsuits and access to common infrastructure. Look how difficult it was for Google to lay fiber in the few cities they have, they have been stopped in their tracks over and over because of lawsuits filed by their competitors (ATT etc).
Also fiber providers have very little incentive to build out fiber to rural customers. Why trench hundreds of miles just to hook up a few dozen people?
Starlink has the advantage of serving ALL rural customers with the same set of satellites. It’s actually very efficient when you think about how many millions of rural people are served by a common set of satellites.
I know this first hand because I would not have internet without Starlink and it has been a godsend. Before Starlink my whole neighborhood was SOL because it would cost hundreds of thousands of dollars to trench out to us.
You underestimate the difficulty of navigating lawsuits and access to common infrastructure. Look how difficult it was for Google to lay fiber in the few cities they have, they have been stopped in their tracks over and over because of lawsuits filed by their competitors (ATT etc).
Also fiber providers have very little incentive to build out fiber to rural customers. Why trench hundreds of miles just to hook up a few dozen people?
Starlink has the advantage of serving ALL rural customers with the same set of satellites. It’s actually very efficient when you think about how many millions of rural people are served by a common set of satellites.
I know this first hand because I would not have internet without Starlink and it has been a godsend. Before Starlink my whole neighborhood was SOL because it would cost hundreds of thousands of dollars to trench out to us.
Permanent yes. But cheaper?
A lot of the places served (as in actual customers) by starlink are in truly remote and difficult to reach places.
I know someone who uses it in the middle of private land surrounded by national forest, 5+ miles from the nearest paved road.
It doesn’t get electricity, and the last quote he was able to get was for $250k+ to attempt to run power from the local utility. But now with Solar….
And he’s not the only one in that region.
Using starlink for dense urban environments? Yeah that makes no sense. It also possibly doesn’t make any sense in suburban environments either.
But dispersed or remote areas? Pretty awesome.
LTE is sometimes a competitor in those situations, but there are a lot of people in those environments that don’t have good line of sight to a cell, but do get plenty of open sky, and Starlink is far superior for them than any other solution.
LTE over these remote areas is also a major capex, and involves a lot of environmental impact.
Hughes/Geo satellite sucks in both latency and bandwidth.
Most LTE data plans are also expensive for this type of thing, as any RV’er will tell you.
In many ways, this solves the ‘everyone must live in the big city to make good money’ problem, if coupled with remote work.
A lot of the places served (as in actual customers) by starlink are in truly remote and difficult to reach places.
I know someone who uses it in the middle of private land surrounded by national forest, 5+ miles from the nearest paved road.
It doesn’t get electricity, and the last quote he was able to get was for $250k+ to attempt to run power from the local utility. But now with Solar….
And he’s not the only one in that region.
Using starlink for dense urban environments? Yeah that makes no sense. It also possibly doesn’t make any sense in suburban environments either.
But dispersed or remote areas? Pretty awesome.
LTE is sometimes a competitor in those situations, but there are a lot of people in those environments that don’t have good line of sight to a cell, but do get plenty of open sky, and Starlink is far superior for them than any other solution.
LTE over these remote areas is also a major capex, and involves a lot of environmental impact.
Hughes/Geo satellite sucks in both latency and bandwidth.
Most LTE data plans are also expensive for this type of thing, as any RV’er will tell you.
In many ways, this solves the ‘everyone must live in the big city to make good money’ problem, if coupled with remote work.
Where did I mention Elon Musk?
> announced the discovery of an unusual asteroid, designated 2018 CN41
Can someone explain why in 2025 they discover an asteroid which gets designated as "2018" and then they delete it when it turns out that it was an object launched in space precisely in 2018?
Can someone explain why in 2025 they discover an asteroid which gets designated as "2018" and then they delete it when it turns out that it was an object launched in space precisely in 2018?
https://www.iau.org/public/themes/naming/
It's initially given a temporary name prior to the now official name.
2018 CN41
Means it's the 41st object identified in the first half of February in 2018.
A is first half of jan. B is 2nd half. Etc.. then the iteration in that section
It's initially given a temporary name prior to the now official name.
2018 CN41
Means it's the 41st object identified in the first half of February in 2018.
A is first half of jan. B is 2nd half. Etc.. then the iteration in that section
I think the question is, how does the 41st object to be discovered in 2018 get that name in 2025?
Clearly there's a missing link to this, as in some guy in a field "finds" an object, submits it, it gets added, it gets identified, it gets removed, and it's actual designation is then used in write-ups as if that name were the one in use before it was identified as not being an object discovered in 2025.
For accuracy, or should say 2025 CN2 (or whatever), aka 2018 CN41, was removed from the database.
Clearly there's a missing link to this, as in some guy in a field "finds" an object, submits it, it gets added, it gets identified, it gets removed, and it's actual designation is then used in write-ups as if that name were the one in use before it was identified as not being an object discovered in 2025.
For accuracy, or should say 2025 CN2 (or whatever), aka 2018 CN41, was removed from the database.
Ooh, I know this one! I worked on historical asteroid observations categorization and precovery for a few years.
The MPC has many observations of unidentified moving object candidates. These are called “tracklets” and come from pairs of observations of the same patch of the sky by the same observatory, separated (typically) by a few minutes.
The “isolated tracklet file”, or ITF, is a catalog of all of these unidentified moving objects.
When an identification is made and submitted to the MPC, the MPC back-projects the orbit and checks the ITF for any past observations which might have actually been of this newly identified object.
Then, the designation’s timestamp is of the first matching observation. So in this case the ITF had an observation from back in 2018.
Occasionally, two “objects” turn out to be the same actual physical object, but we learn late. In this case, the MPC does maintain a list of “aliases” of the object, so you might get that “aka” list. But that is not quite what happened here.
The MPC has many observations of unidentified moving object candidates. These are called “tracklets” and come from pairs of observations of the same patch of the sky by the same observatory, separated (typically) by a few minutes.
The “isolated tracklet file”, or ITF, is a catalog of all of these unidentified moving objects.
When an identification is made and submitted to the MPC, the MPC back-projects the orbit and checks the ITF for any past observations which might have actually been of this newly identified object.
Then, the designation’s timestamp is of the first matching observation. So in this case the ITF had an observation from back in 2018.
Occasionally, two “objects” turn out to be the same actual physical object, but we learn late. In this case, the MPC does maintain a list of “aliases” of the object, so you might get that “aka” list. But that is not quite what happened here.
I'm not an expert but my understanding is it takes multiple observations to pin down an orbit and be sure it isn't an existing object. Those observations can be very chance driven.
The year and number designator is for known man made object launches. All satellites get a COSPAR ID
It's done in sequential order.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Designator
Even top secret NRO launches get a designator, since it's impossible to hide the launch itself, but its orbital activity and TLE might not be obvious once in space.
It's done in sequential order.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Designator
Even top secret NRO launches get a designator, since it's impossible to hide the launch itself, but its orbital activity and TLE might not be obvious once in space.
To determine object, in most cases need and enough, to determine it's orbit. In case of Near Earth Object, most interest parameters, when it was near Earth and period to next approach.
Looks like, astronomer calculated from single point, this object was approached in 2018, which is launch year, because Roadster don't have long running engines (none of space sails or ion engines), so it's orbit don't changed much after 2018.
- Ion engines or space sails could work many years, so it will not be easy to discover start point from just one known point of current orbit.
Looks like, astronomer calculated from single point, this object was approached in 2018, which is launch year, because Roadster don't have long running engines (none of space sails or ion engines), so it's orbit don't changed much after 2018.
- Ion engines or space sails could work many years, so it will not be easy to discover start point from just one known point of current orbit.
That headline reads like something from The Onion.
More seriously, if they are tracking objects orbiting near the earth, I think the origin of them shouldn't matter.
More seriously, if they are tracking objects orbiting near the earth, I think the origin of them shouldn't matter.
It's tracked as debris and not an asteroid.
It was deleted because it's already tracked
It was deleted because it's already tracked
So the takeaway I get is that these two databases should be cross linked so this doesn’t happen again. Maybe there’s a community of software developers who could help.
Quick! Someone write the Falsehoods Programmers Make About Space article.
If only there were some sort of article explaining the need for transparency between organizations regarding these things.
That would be great. Instead, we got an article vaguely demanding "transparency" for "untracked" objects, when the motivating example for the article is an object that was actually very well tracked and was launched with millions of witnesses live on stream.
> Deep space is “largely unregulated,” McDowell told a special-session audience Jan. 14 at the American Astronomical Society’s (AAS) winter meeting in National Harbor, Maryland. “There’s no requirement to file some kind of public flight plan, no equivalent of the TLEs or the corporate data that we get for low-orbit satellites.”
This will be one of my favorite regulatory journalistic scare-quotes going forward.
This will be one of my favorite regulatory journalistic scare-quotes going forward.
Those aren’t scare quotes. That’s just a quote.
They might just be normal quotes.
Yes, it's a journalistic quote meant to scare, not quotation marks meant to express irony.
>After launch on the Falcon-Heavy rocket, it orbited Earth for six hours, until a third burn of the stage two inserted the Tesla Roadster into an interplanetary solar orbit reaching out toward the asteroid belt and having a perihelion of 0.99 AU and an aphelion of ~1.7 AU. This orbit will be stable for several million years.
https://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/nmc/spacecraft/display.action?id...
https://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/nmc/spacecraft/display.action?id...
isn't this a good thing? it sets an exciting lower bound on the effectiveness of citizen science detection efforts, and a confirmation that the techniques are sound
I would think that the albedo of the tesla is much higher than the typical asteroid, making it much easier to track.
Your perspective would've made for a much better article.
Remember the hope?
https://youtu.be/rpO1U-nEgRU?feature=shared
https://youtu.be/rpO1U-nEgRU?feature=shared
On a related note, a science fiction short story anthology titled "Derelict" was published in 2021. When they were soliciting stories, I thought long and hard about how to put a creative twist on the topic. I wrote a story about a race to recover Elon's roadster, which made it into the anthology.
Free story: https://s3.us-west-1.amazonaws.com/com.markdjacobsen/Celesti...
Full anthology: https://www.amazon.com/Derelict-Campbell-Jack/dp/1940709407/
Free story: https://s3.us-west-1.amazonaws.com/com.markdjacobsen/Celesti...
Full anthology: https://www.amazon.com/Derelict-Campbell-Jack/dp/1940709407/
I think it would have been cool for SpaceX to put a teapot in the roadster's trunk.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russell's_teapot
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russell's_teapot
Maybe they did. You can't prove that they didn't!
ahah thank you for letting me discover Russel's Teapot. As a Pastafarian priest I will add a teapot to my rituals while I venerate the Flying Spaghetti Monster:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flying_Spaghetti_Monster
I read the headline incorrectly as hard delete
But looks they just soft deleted the entry in their database.
But looks they just soft deleted the entry in their database.
Would have been interesting if we did just throw a satellite at it to deflect it's course.
Then I remembered we're still probably decades from being able to do such things on demand.
Then I remembered we're still probably decades from being able to do such things on demand.
There's an entire belt of them in orbit around the sun between Mars and Jupiter.
Interesting fact: University of Southhampton developed 5D disks for dense data storage. The capability was acquired by the Arch Foundation which seeks to preserve data longterm. They donated one of the first 5D disks to Elon Musk who placed it in the red Tesla that he sent into Solar orbit on the first Falcon Heavy booster. The disk contains the Foundation Trilogy by Arthur C. Clarke.
>The disk contains the Foundation Trilogy by Arthur C. Clarke.
You mean Asimov?
You mean Asimov?
[deleted]
Yet another case of astronomer entitlement. You don't own the universe, astronomers.
In the same way biologies don't own santient species, yes. Someoems gotta classify this stuff, though.
yeah, everyone knows that belongs to the astrophysicists
/dash/
/dash/
That space garbage is still a wonderful advertisement for the deposit on the next roadster. Also, there's almost certainly a corpse in the trunk.
Isn't this, like other space junk in such orbits, effectively an "anthropogenic asteroid"? Why not just add them in with a special tag or naming convention to indicate that they're man-made?