dipper@utastro.UUCP (Debbie Byrd) (10/30/86)
When an asteroid came near to Earth -- after this. October 30 Hermes On this date in the year 1937 an asteroid passed less than half a million miles from Earth. That's the nearest approach known so far that any asteroid has made to this planet. The asteroid was named for Hermes, after the Greek god of good luck, swiftness and messages. Karl Reinmuth, an astronomer in Heidelberg, Germany, discovered Hermes just days before the asteroid's closest approach. Hermes was observed for nine days as it moved very rapidly across the sky. It swept nearest to Earth on the daylight side of our planet on today's date in the year 1937. The asteroid came within 465,000 miles -- less than twice the distance to the moon. Asteroids are small rocky bodies -- debris leftover from when the sun and planets formed. Thousands of asteroids are known to orbit between the planets Mars and Jupiter but we know of dozens that travel within the inner solar system -- and many of them cross the Earth's orbit. Asteroids that cross inward from Earth's orbit are called Apollo asteroids -- after the first such asteroid discovered. Hermes is a member of the class of Apollo asteroids. It has been calculated that Hermes approaches within 58 million miles of the sun -- and travels farther out than the orbit of Mars. Hermes has not been seen again since l937. It traveled so swiftly that many of its sightings were made by astronomers taking observations of other objects. Nowadays there are deliberate surveys underway for Apollo asteroids. Someday soon a spacecraft will be sent to visit such an asteroid -- since they are among the most accessible bodies in the solar system for probes launched from Earth. Script by Diana Hadley. (c) Copyright 1985, 1986 McDonald Observatory, University of Texas at Austin