Asteroid 433 Eros early Monday morning, 16-jan-2012

Dick Steinberg

Animation of the Amor-type (Mars-crossing) asteroid 433 Eros as it begins to swing by Earth for its closest approach since 1975.

http://www.physics.drexel.edu/~steinberg/astro2/recent images/2012-01/2012-01-15 FSQ images/eros near m95-FSQ.gif
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Distance of Eros for these images was 0.19 AU (about 28 million km). Magnitude was 8.4, bright for an asteroid only 34 km long. At closest approach near Feb 1st, Eros' distance will be 26.7 million km.

The galaxies M96 and M95 (both in Leo) are upper left and upper center, respectively.

In a median-combined stack of the eighteen 2-minute images (without animation), fainter objects can be seen, although Eros is nearly obscured by its motion:

http://www.physics.drexel.edu/~steinberg/astro2/recent%20images/2012-01/2012-01-15%20FSQ%20images/eros%20near%20m95(r) m96(l)%2018x2min-FSQ.jpg

For example, the 14th magnitude near edge-on galaxy PGC32251 lies about 3cm from the left edge and 6 cm above the bottom edge.

For more information on Eros, see http://www.sydneyobservatory.com.au/2011/eros-is-coming-433-eros-the-asteroid-that-allowed-astronomers-to-measure-the-distance-of-the-sun-makes-its-closest-approach-since-1975-in-januaryfebruary-2012/

Images were obtained with the 4-inch Takahashi FSQ106 fluorite refractor at BMVO during the night of Sunday-Monday, Jan 15-16.
 

PS- There are at least 3 other asteroids visible on this animation. Can anyone find them? Hint: they are much fainter and slower moving than Eros.

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Astroimage webpage:
http://www.physics.drexel.edu/~steinberg/Astro Welcome.html
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