The Earth is getting an extra moon this autumn – at least temporarily. Our planet's gravity has captured an asteroid on a stray path, and the asteroid will orbit the Earth for about two months, between September 29 and November 25.
The asteroid was discovered by astronomers on August 7 in one of NASA's space programs, according to CNN. The fact that it "got stuck" in the Earth's gravitational field is due to its relatively low speed, which makes it more affected by the Earth's force field.
The asteroid comes from the asteroid belt Arjuna, which orbits the Sun, and is expected to return there after it has finished orbiting the Earth.
This is not the first time the Earth has been visited by "mini-moons" – it also happened in 1981 and 2022.
