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‘Quasi’ Moon Discovered Orbiting Earth

NASA says there is a previously undiscovered "quasi" moon orbiting the Earth and sun.

Astronomers have discovered a new “quasi” moon orbiting Earth.

2016 HO3, as the asteroid is called, is at least 40 meters across and could be larger, up to 100 meters, researchers say, but it’s too far from Earth to qualify as a true satellite or mini-moon.

"Since 2016 HO3 loops around our planet, but never ventures very far away as we both go around the sun, we refer to it as a quasi-satellite of Earth," said Paul Chodas, manager of NASA's Center for Near-Earth Object (NEO) Studies at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California.


The asteroid, NASA says, “spends about half of the time closer to the sun than Earth and passes ahead of our planet, and about half of the time farther away, causing it to fall behind.”


2016 HO3 was first observed in April by the Pan-STARRS 1 asteroid survey telescope on Haleakala, Hawaii.

Here's a video about 2016 HO3: