More strangeness in the Kuiper Belt

[mmcirvin]

james_nicoll's mention reminded me of 2003 EL61, the giant whirling cigar.

There are lots of cigar- or peanut-shaped asteroids, but they're typically small bodies. This thing is almost as big as Pluto.

There was also a bit of angsty drama surrounding its discovery, which incidentally led to the earlier-than-planned announcement of the "tenth planet" 2003 UB313, as you can read on the 2003 UB313 page.

Comments

[mmcirvin.livejournal.com]

...To put it another way, if their best guess is right, this is a whirling cigar long enough to stretch from Boston to Omaha.