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\n\t\tAn artist\u2019s impression of 469219 Kamo\u2019oalewa (Picture: Sharkey et al.\/Nature Communications\/University of Arizona)<\/p>\n
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\n\t\tAn artist\u2019s impression of 469219 Kamo\u2019oalewa (Picture: Sharkey et al.\/Nature Communications\/University of Arizona)<\/p>\n
Earth\u2019s second moon is ready for its close-up. <\/p>\n
China<\/a> has shared the first-ever photograph of 469219 Kamo\u2019oalewa, Hawaiian for \u2018wobbling celestial object\u2019.<\/p>\n Known to scientists as 2016HO3, the unusual near-Earth asteroid<\/a> loops around the blue marble but is actually gravitationally bound to the sun. <\/p>\n Experts suspect this space rock is a piece of the lunar surface<\/a>\u00a0torn off by a meteor impact, so it could be a time capsule for the early solar system. <\/p>\n Which is exactly why China\u2019s space agency sent the robotic Tianwen-2 spacecraft\u00a0to collect samples of it last year. <\/p>\n Now, after travelling around 600million miles for 400 days, the space bot has sent back a historic photo of the rock.<\/p>\n \t\t The image was taken just 20km from the asteroid, the Chinese National Space Administration<\/a> (CNSA) said yesterday.<\/p>\n Kamo\u02bboalewa is estimated to be about 100 metres in diameter, which, if proven, would make it the smallest asteroid a spacecraft has ever said hello to. <\/p>\n Since the object only skirts by Earth every 45 years, it\u2019s not officially a moon in the natural satellite sense. <\/p>\n Instead, it\u2019s one of just seven \u2018quasi-moons\u2019<\/a> our planet has and is a type of asteroid called Apollo, which more or less snuggles up to Earth\u2019s orbit. <\/p>\n From what we\u2019ve seen so far<\/a>, its orbital waltz with Earth began about a century ago, and will continue for a few more centuries. <\/p>\n Taking a cosmic photo isn\u2019t as simple as point and shoot \u2013 officials had to use optical navigation data to check the asteroid\u2019s position beforehand.<\/p>\n \t\t This is vital because the eccentric rock is so tiny and often hides in the shadows of our planet; it\u2019s hard to keep track of.<\/p>\n The rock\u2019s trajectory, called ephemeris, shows that it\u2019s tailing just behind the Earth\u2019s clockwise orbit, according to a report <\/a>published on China\u2019s Lunar and Planetary Data Release System. <\/p>\n Asteroids, sometimes called minor planets, are made up of the remnants of the early days of the solar system. <\/p>\n These rocks can be as small as a frying pan or as wide as 329 miles<\/a> but if all were squished together, they\u2019d have less mass than the moon<\/a>.<\/p>\n In Kamo\u2019oalewa\u2019s case, scientists discovered <\/a>in 2021 that it seems to be made of the same frozen minerals found on the lunar surface.<\/p>\n \t\t In other words, there\u2019s a good chance it\u2019s a stray chunk of the moon that\u2019s decided to tag along with us; three other quasi-moons have a similar composition, so they could have come from the same cataclysmic lunar strike. <\/p>\n Others suggest it\u2019s an asteroid caught in Earth\u2019s gravitational dance, or the fragment of a rock torn apart by the Earth-Moon system. <\/p>\n Where this asteroid came from is one of the main questions China\u2019s mission wants to answer. <\/p>\n Tianwen-2 lifted off\u00a0aboard a Long March 3B rocket from the Xichang Satellite Launch Center in southwest China\u00a0in May, state media said<\/a>. <\/p>\n The next step will be for the robot to scoop up some celestial matter into a capsule\u00a0before crash-landing into Earth late next year. <\/p>\n The CNSA added yesterday: \u2018Going forward, the probe will gradually conduct more detailed scientific explorations to obtain information on the asteroid\u2019s shape, material composition and internal structure, providing support for preparations for sampling.\u2019<\/p>\n If China pulls this off, it\u2019ll become the first country in the world \u2013 after Japan<\/a> and the US<\/a> \u2013 to retrieve material from a flying asteroid. <\/p>\n Get in touch with our news team by emailing us at webnews@metro.co.uk<\/a>.<\/p>\n For more stories like this, check our news page<\/a>.<\/p>\n Arrow Arrow Arrow![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/SEI_304360960-1d3b-e1783419951386.jpg\")
\n\t\tThe first-ever image taken of Kamo\u2019oalewa. \u2018\u7c73\u2019 in the bottom left corner is the Chinese word for metre (Picture: The China National Space Administration)<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/SEI_304360965-04f4.jpg\")
\n\t\tThe space rock loops around the sun, not the Earth (Picture: Lunar and Deep Space Exploration Science Application Center)<\/p>\n![\"A](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/SEI_299761849-39d3.jpg\")
\n\t\tScientists think the space rock is an old chunk of the moon (Picture: AP Photo\/Armando Franca)<\/p>\n
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