ALERT! NEO Asteroid 1998 QE2 Close Approach- 31st May, 2013.

[AstroJunk (Jonathan)]

Originally Posted by h0ughy

awesome - i saw Andrew's work and yours is just as impressive

Thanks, next up is 1999 WC2 in the 13th of June, but not nearly as nice an object - too far away at 39 LD

[astroron (Ron)]

Nice work Jonathan
That lovely coloured finderscope
Really suits that scope\
Cheers

[OzEclipse (Joe Cali)]

Jonathan.
Fantastic work and with a bit of luck getting the trifecta. Excellent!
Joe

[Suzy]

That was awesome Jonathon- I watched it over and over and over again!
Loved the satellite and meteor screaming through next it.
I'll pop this on the IIS fb page later today.

It was raining so I didn't get to see it, you obviously had better weather than me on the northside (I'm on the south). I noticed around 11pm it looked like it was clearing though.

[ZeroID (Brent)]

Might have some gaps in the clouds tonight. I have it marked as between Saturn and Antares, Close to Zuben.. at about 22:30
Be the first time I've been out on the Ob for nearly a month !
Fingers crossed ...

[ZeroID (Brent)]

Shoulda kept me big mouf shut, damn clewds musta heard me. Now it's pea soup out there.
< General swearing and muttering noises >

[Rob_K]

Well, I missed it at its closest due to rainy weather but got it at its brightest last night, in early evening. Animation here:
http://i727.photobucket.com/albums/w...e2013anima.gif

Cheers -

[astroron (Ron)]

Good capture Rob
Cheers

[Rob_K]

Thanks Ron.

[Astroman (Andrew Wall)]

Well done rob. Completely forgot about it lastnight

[ZeroID (Brent)]

Well, looks that one wasn't to be for me. Been solid cloud cover since last Thursday and now we have some serious rain. I set up twice over the weekend when it looked promising, must have spooked the cloud gods.

OK, whens the next one, I suspect I won't be around for the return visit of that one

[Rob_K]

Amazing facts about 1998 QE2's passage past Earth...

At the time I took the image posted above, 1998 QE2 at 6.1 million kilometres distance subtended an angle of less than 1/10 of an arcsecond.

Earth viewed from the asteroid at a distance of 6.1 million kilometres would look only a quarter of the diameter of the Moon viewed from Earth. Given the Earth's diameter of 12,756 km, try to imagine how tiny a 2.7km diameter rock on Earth would appear from that distance - the equivalent of trying to spot something slightly smaller than Uluru from that distance. (need to get a life...)

Cheers -