← Back to dex - Passes within two lunar distances of Earth's orbit +18
- Aten: mostly inside Earth's orbit +8
- Near-Earth object +5
- Catalogue designation only +0
Total score 31
3 more points to reach Rare.
Badges
- 🌠 Near-Earth object · +5
- 🔢 Catalogue designation only
- ⚱️ Aten: mostly inside Earth's orbit · +8
- 🪡 Passes within two lunar distances of Earth's orbit · +18
✨ Trivia
What it actually is
- 🛸 Its orbit family. An Aten-class object, spending most of its time inside Earth's orbit and crossing ours from the sunward side — which makes this family wretchedly hard to spot against the daylight.
- 🌞 Closest approach. At its nearest it comes within 0.79 AU of the Sun — inside the orbit of Earth.
- 🔁 One lap. A single orbit around the Sun takes it about 357 days.
- 🥏 How far it roams. Its orbit swings between 0.79 and 1.18 AU from the Sun.
Sense of scale
- 🧱 Sense of scale. In everyday terms it is about 0.5 football pitches across.
Standing on it
- 🦘 Don't jump. Escape velocity here is only around 0.03 m/s. A determined jump would launch you off it and into your own orbit around the Sun.
By the numbers
- 📐 Estimated size. Nobody has measured its size directly. Assuming it reflects light like a typical asteroid, its brightness implies something roughly 49 metres across.
What's in a name
- 🔢 Designation. Known only by its catalogue designation — no name yet.
Properties
- aphelion au
- 1.18
- designation
- 2002 VX91
- eccentricity
- 0.2014
- full name
- (2002 VX91)
- h mag
- 24.3
- inclination
- 2.34
- mean motion deg day
- 1.009
- moid au
- 0.0019
- name
- 2002 VX91
- number only
- yes
- orbit class
- ATE
- perihelion au
- 0.786
- semi major au
- 0.9843
About 2002 VX91
2002 VX91 is an uncommon neo. It swings within 0.786 AU of the Sun at perihelion.
An Aten-class object, spending most of its time inside Earth's orbit and crossing ours from the sunward side — which makes this family wretchedly hard to spot against the daylight.
How to see it
Like any astronomical target, 2002 VX91 is best seen from a dark site away from city lights, and when it is above the horizon depends on your latitude and the time of year. Because it moves against the background stars, the live position panel on this page tracks where it is right now. The visibility panel above works out tonight's viewing window for your saved location.
Why 2002 VX91 is an uncommon neo
2002 VX91 scores 31 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the uncommon tier. Another 3 points would lift it into a rarer tier.
That score comes from 4 science badges — Near-Earth object, Catalogue designation only, Aten: mostly inside Earth's orbit and Passes within two lunar distances of Earth's orbit — each earned for a real, measurable property of the object. Rarity on Spacedle is never random: the more remarkable an object's astrophysics, the more badges it collects, the higher it scores, and the rarer it ranks.