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Score breakdown
· 6 badges
40 pts · Rare
Rare50 pts → Epic
Large body (100-500 km)+12
Darker than charcoal+10
Notably bright (low H)+8
Has a proper name+8
Asteroid+1
Main-belt asteroid+1
Total score40
10 more points to reach Epic.
Badges
🪨Asteroid· +1
🗿Large body (100-500 km)· +12
💡Notably bright (low H)· +8
🏷️Has a proper name· +8
🥌Main-belt asteroid· +1
🕶️Darker than charcoal· +10
✨ Trivia
What it actually is
🛸Its orbit family. A main-belt asteroid, one of millions circling between Mars and Jupiter. Despite the films, the belt is so empty that every spacecraft sent through it has crossed without aiming for anything.
🌞Closest approach. At its nearest it comes within 2.04 AU of the Sun — inside the orbit of Jupiter.
🔁One lap. A single orbit around the Sun takes it about 4.4 years.
🥏How far it roams. Its orbit swings between 2.04 and 3.34 AU from the Sun.
Sense of scale
🧱Sense of scale. In everyday terms it is about 5.3× the length of Manhattan island.
🚶Walk around it. Walking its equator at a steady pace, eight hours a day, would take about 9 days.
Standing on it
🥶Sunlight there. Even at its closest the sunlight is only about 24% as strong as Earth's.
By the numbers
📐Size. Roughly 115 km across.
Properties
albedo
0.04
aphelion au
3.34
designation
505
diameter km
115
eccentricity
0.2425
full name
505 Cava (A902 QA)
h mag
8.74
inclination
9.82
mean motion deg day
0.2238
moid au
1.05
name
Cava
named
yes
orbit class
MBA
perihelion au
2.035
rotation period h
8.1789
semi major au
2.687
spec taxonomy
FC
spect
FC
About Cava
Cava is a rare asteroid. It has spectral type FC and swings within 2.035 AU of the Sun at perihelion.
A main-belt asteroid, one of millions circling between Mars and Jupiter. Despite the films, the belt is so empty that every spacecraft sent through it has crossed without aiming for anything.
How to see it
Like any astronomical target, Cava 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 Cava is a rare asteroid
Cava scores 40 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the rare tier. Another 10 points would lift it into a rarer tier.
That score comes from 6 science badges — Asteroid, Large body (100-500 km), Notably bright (low H), Has a proper name, Main-belt asteroid and Darker than charcoal — 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.