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 Earth to get ‘mini-moon’ for 2 months.

Earth is set to witness a ‘mini-moon’ called 2024 PT5, a small asteroid that will not collide with Earth but will orbit around it, similar to the Moon, for a brief period of around two months by the end of this month.

According to a paper published in the Research Notes of the American Astronomical Society, the asteroid will be temporarily captured by Earth's gravity until around November. Detected by the Asteroid Terrestrial-Impact Last Alert System (ATLAS) on August 7, it will orbit Earth from September 29 to November 25 before breaking free from the planet's gravitational pull.

Astronomers refer to it as a “temporarily captured flyby” since it won’t complete a full orbit. In contrast, mini-moons that do complete a full orbit are known as “temporarily captured orbiters”.

A report by Live Science mentioned a study suggesting that 2024 PT5 likely originated from the Arjuna asteroid belt, which contains space rocks that orbit the sun near Earth. Due to its orbit being similar to Earth's, calculations show that the asteroid will return to orbit Earth in January 2025 and again in 2055.