ASTEROID FLYBY: Is it an asteroid (mystery object 2010 AL30 flew past Earth only 1/3rd the distance to the Moon)

ASTEROID FLYBY: Is it an asteroid or a derelict spacecraft? Just hours ago, mystery object 2010 AL30 flew past Earth only 1/3rd the distance to the Moon, and telescopes around the world were watching. In Colombia, amateur astronomer Alberto Quijano Vodniza used a 14-inch Meade LX200 to record the close approach:

[link to spaceweather.com]

"2010 AL30 is the faint streak moving among the stars," says Vodniza. "The full-length animation reveals a second much brighter object. That's a satellite that happened to be passing by at the same time." Space is a busy place, it seems.

Discovered barely three days ago, 2010 AL30 is catalogued as a 10m-class asteroid. Curiously, though, its elliptical orbit has a period of almost exactly one year, the same as Earth. This raises the possibility that it might be a piece of some spacecraft from our own planet.

NASA's Goldstone radar in the Mojave desert was scheduled to ping 2010 AL30 between 2:20 and 4:40 UTC on Jan. 13th. The echoes should reveal the nature of this interesting passerby. Stay tuned for updates.