February 8, 2016 - Asteroid of Love
Asteroid of Love On Valentine’s Day in 2000, after traveling 3.2 billion km (2 billion mi) over the course of five years, NASA’s solar-powered Near Earth Asteroid Rendezvous (NEAR) Shoemaker spacecraft became the first spacecraft to orbit an asteroid when it began circling 433 Eros, a 33-km-long (20.5-mile) near-Earth asteroid. Nearly a year later, fifteen years ago this week, NEAR Shoemaker made another first when it touched down on the surface of Eros after a controlled descent. NEAR returned surface data for another two weeks, and gathered unprecedented data on the characteristics, composition, and geology of Eros. Discovered in 1898, Eros is named after the Greek god of love, and despite being an NEA, will never impact Earth, even though its orbit does on occasion bring it even closer than Mars.
Image credit: NASA / JPL / JHUAPL
Weekly Calendar
February 8-14, 2016
Holidays - Sky Events - Space History
Monday 8
Chinese New Year
New Moon 9:39 AM ET
1828: Jules Verne born
1974: 84-day Skylab 4 mission ends, last crew to occupy Skylab
2010: STS-130 Endeavour launched
Tuesday 9
Neptune 2° south of Moon
1971: Apollo 14 returns from Moon; last post-mission quarantine
Wednesday 10
Ash Wednesday
Moon at perigee
1990: Galileo spacecraft passes by Venus on its way to Jupiter
1992: First Atlas II launch
Thursday 11
1970: First Japanese satellite launched
1984: STS-41B Challenger makes first shuttle landing at KSC
1997: STS-82 Discovery launched
2000: STS-99 Endeavour launched
2010: Solar Dynamics Observatory launched
Friday 12
Uranus 1.7° north of Moon
1963: NASA selects contractor to build the Crawler Transporter
1974: Mars 5 enters orbit around Mars
2001: NEAR-Shoemaker lands on asteroid Eros
Saturday 13
1852: Johan Dreyer born
1937: Sigmund Jähn born, first German to fly in space
Sunday 14
Valentine’s Day
1972: Luna 20 launched
1980: Solar Max launched
1990: Voyager 1 takes solar system "family portrait"
2000: NEAR-Shoemaker orbits asteroid Eros