Can you see Earth's new 'minimoon' with the naked eye?

Can you see Earth's new 'minimoon' with the naked eye?
www.livescience.com...

On Sunday (Sept. 29), Earth captured a "second moon" that will accompany our planet on its journey around the sun for the next two months.

The clingy space rock is actually a near-Earth asteroid named 2024 PT5, which measures an estimated 33 feet (10 meters) wide, or about the length of a school bus. Snagged by Earth's gravity during an unusually close approach, this "minimoon" is predicted to orbit our planet for just 57 days; on Nov. 25, the asteroid will break free of Earth's influence and resume its regular orbit of the sun without a chaperone, astronomers wrote in the journal Research Notes of the AAS.

While the idea of a "second moon" may sound surreal and exciting, 2024 PT5 will be a mostly invisible travel companion. Measuring at least 300,000 times smaller than our permanent moon,the new minimoon is far too tiny to be visible to the naked eye — and commercial backyard telescopes and stargazing binoculars won't help much, either.

Gotta love how scientists are calling this a mini moon when you can't even see it with your naked eye. It's like the bait and switch. When you hear MOON you look at the night sky and see that massive white lit mass up there. But with 2024 PTS being called a mini Moon it's like a little spec up there. Why couldn't they just say it's a 57 day space rock? I guess it's to create sensationalist headlines. So disappointing!

a reply to: Skywatcher2011

Its about the size of a bus so i dont know about that.

It might be visible through binoculars or a telescope through.

originally posted by: andy06shake
a reply to: Skywatcher2011

Its about the size of a bus so i dont know about that.

It might be visible through binoculars or a telescope through.

According to the article it says,"...and commercial backyard telescopes and stargazing binoculars won't help much, either."

So who knows...too many chemtrails and cloud seeding happening in the sky to see it anyway.

Well an asteroid becomes a moon when it begins to orbit a planet, and not orbit a star. Isn't that right? A natural satellite of a planet? Not sure but they may simply be using the scientific definition of a moon instead of calling it an asteroid, which it will become again when it leaves earth orbit.

a reply to: AlexandrosOMegas

Moonlet?

Seems like a great waste to just let it leave. Surely they could change its course by landing on it and keeping it trapped. How hard would it be for us to send a school bus size rock into space to use in some way?
It’s a resource and we should at least take advantage of this in some way for future science.

Maybe Elon will come along and use it.

a reply to: Skywatcher2011

You are obviously confusing the words Moon and moon. The word Moon refers only to the Earth's moon and no other moon. It is the commonly used name for the Earth's moon. Now moon refers to any object in orbit of a planet. Mostly naturally occuring objects.

A mini moon is in no way to be considered a mini Moon. They are entirely different objects. You could use the proper name for the Moon to clear up the confusion. That is Luna. But most people don't know that.

I hope this helps.

Just like NASA...

Pluto is too small to be a planet, but this boulder is a moon.

a reply to: theatreboy

Here:

education.nationalgeographic.org...

Unlike Planets, size doesn't matter with moons.

originally posted by: Oldcarpy2
a reply to: theatreboy

Here:

education.nationalgeographic.org...

Unlike Planets, size doesn't matter with moons.

I see. So it is just arbitrary what is big enough.

We humans are so self centered.

a reply to: theatreboy

True.

I do feel sorry for Pluto.

Earth has 2 true moons and at least 7 quasi-moons and at least 13 known minimoons (prior to this one) as far as I remember from interviewing astrophysics profs. There's another type called spectre or ghost but I never understood the definition of those.

a reply to: bastion

Kordylewski clouds are ghost moons, which are basically debris clouds at the Lagrange points. I'm not sure why they're called a ghost moon, though, as I wouldn't really call orbiting debris clouds a moon.