2026 QQ8: Earth's new mini-moon is the size of a person

How did Earth capture 2026 QQ8?

The rock mostly orbits the Sun, one lap every 359 days, so it keeps drifting back near us. In April it got close enough to enter Earth's Hill sphere, the region where our planet's gravity can hold small bodies on temporary orbits. Since then it has been bound to Earth.

Its path looks nothing like the Moon's near-circular orbit. It is a messy loop shaped by the pull of Earth, the Sun and the Moon together, and it is not stable. Current calculations say it stays until the end of December, after about 1.5 laps around Earth, then returns to circling the Sun in early 2027. You cannot see it with the naked eye or an amateur telescope.

Rock or rocket part?

That was the hard bit. From hundreds of thousands of kilometres away, a rocket fragment can look like a small asteroid. Astronomers measured how solar radiation pressure pushed on the object. A light, hollow piece of metal reacts differently from a dense rock, and the results pointed to rock.

There is precedent. 2020 SO turned out to be a rocket stage from the 1966 Surveyor 2 mission. For 2026 QQ8, researchers found no link to any known artificial object.

Is it a danger to Earth?

No. Its orbit is well understood. The figure of about 0.0038 astronomical units, or 568,000 km, is the minimum distance between the two orbits, not how far apart the bodies are now. A 1 to 2 metre rock would most likely burn up in the atmosphere anyway.

Its value is scientific: it shows how often Earth grabs small bodies and how long it can hold them. It passed fairly close in 1965, and the next notable approach is expected in 2058, with no capture predicted either time.