Ultima Thule

[kleptoquark]

After visiting Pluto, NASA's New Horizons mission has stopped by an asteroid (er, "trans-Neptunian object") that happened to be convenient.

They nicknamed it Ultima Thule back when they didn't have any detailed images of it.

Turns out it looks like this:



Per BBC, "The scientists have decided to call the larger lobe 'Ultima', and the smaller lobe 'Thule'."

Comments

[thetransintransgenic]

Super Mario Galaxy IS REAL!

[youzicha]

My favorite part of the story is the observations from earth. It's too small to resolve in a telescope, and too dim to be seen in any case, but the could still see it's shape by having several telescope observe it pass in front of a star at the same time.