Quick, when you look at the night sky, how many moons do you see?
It’s hard to believe, but some reports circulating on social media say there are two moons and there will be for several decades.
One is the normal moon that we see most nights. But the other — 2025 PN7 — is considered a quasi-moon, ABC News reported.
But it really isn’t a moon, and it doesn’t orbit the Earth, but quasi moons do seem to for short periods.
What quasi moons, which are asteroids, really do is orbit the sun in a path that is similar to Earth’s, so they appear to be a moon.
It also does not have any gravitational force, The Philadelphia Inquirer reported.
“As a result, they sometimes ‘keep company’ with the Earth for years, or even decades,” Cornell University astronomy professor Phil Nicholson told ABC News. “Think of a wolf that follows the camp of a band of prehistoric hunters, looking for scraps, but doesn’t actually become a part of their band and eventually leaves.”
This one is about 20 million miles from Earth, or about 70 times farther than the real moon, the Inquirer said.
So, how long will 2025 PN7 be sticking around?
A paper published last month in IOP Science said until 2083. Some believe it has been around for about 60 years already.
And it wasn’t too difficult to overlook, since it is very small, relatively speaking, dark, and far away, so you need a very powerful telescope to be able to see it. NASA said not even regular telescopes can see it because it is so dim.
The quasi moon or quasi satellite was found by a 6-foot-diameter telescope on a mountaintop in Maui, Hawaii, The Philadelphia Inquirer reported.
In all, there are about half a dozen partial, temporary or quasi-moons found near Earth, Northeastern University astrophysicists told ABC News.
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