March 2020 Newsletter

The Fly-Eye Telescope is an innovative project of ESA‘s SSA-NEO Segment that will focus on survey and follow-up of NEOs. Another important milestone on the way to build the telescope was achieved: from 30 July to 1 August ESA attended the acceptance test of the equatorial mount at its production site in Verona, Italy.

The closest approach distance is not the only important parameter for assessing the asteroid hazard. The velocity plays a crucial role in shaping the outcome of a close encounter as well as in evaluating the consequences of an impact. The speed at which an asteroid flies by the Earth results from geometrical and dynamical considerations characterizing its pre-encounter orbit.

The month of June 2002, 15 years ago, marked the kick-off of six parallel preliminary studies carried out by ESA’s General Studies Programme (GSP) in order to analyse possible asteroid missions. Three of those studies were devoted to in-orbit telescopes for NEO discovery and characterization, other two were devoted to asteroid rendezvous missions and finally one for asteroid rendezvous and impact.

For the first time in the history of NEA observations more than 2 000 new NEAs have been discovered in one calendar year, resulting in a monthly average of nearly 170 new asteroids. In addition, 2017 was the fifth year in a row with NEA discoveries above a thousand.

In October 2017 the Pan-STARRS survey discovered the first known interstellar object transiting through our Solar System. Named ‘Oumuamua by the discoverers, it soon became the focus of numerous observations by the world's largest professional telescopes.