1998 KY26 is an object in space, and it’s a very, very fast one. For some mysterious reason that no one can figure out yet, it’s getting faster. This happens with asteroids sometimes, but this one’s different. There might be some kind of propulsion source that’s moving this thing along.
In a study published in the journal Icarus, as reported by ScienceAlert, astronomers can’t make heads or tails of this weird, 36-foot-wide weirdo of a space rock, which spins on its axis every 5 ½ minutes and is currently about 186 million miles from Earth.
Cue the chorus of far-out theories, like from everyone’s favorite conspiratorial Harvard astronomer, Avi Loeb, who you might remember as the guy who believed Comet 3I/ATLAS could have been an ancient alien artifact. This time, Loeb isn’t reaching super deep into alien theories, as he suggests 1998 KY26 may be a dead Soviet spacecraft.
Loeb’s theories are always a bit fanciful. Best to stick with the prevailing scientific hypothesis that KY 26 is a “dark comet,” meaning it’s a sneaky comet with no tail that accelerates by outgassing water vapor into space, using its own melting as propulsion.
Good theory, right? Makes a lot of sense. There’s a ton of logic to it. Case closed.
Well, that theory just got blown up.
This Asteroid Is Speeding Up for Reasons Scientists Still Can’t Fully Explain
Georgia Tech aerospace engineers Korbin Hansen and Masatoshi Hirabayashi ran thermal 3D models on the comet to see if hidden ice could actually survive inside it. They found that KY26 is way too warm. For buried ice to hang around over long cosmic timescales, temperatures need to stay below a frosty -198°F.
Even the coldest spots on KY26 average around -53°F to -61°F. At those temperatures, any internal water reserve would have completely evaporated within 2,000 years. If that ice were powering its weird acceleration, the whole stash would burn up in 62 years.
So what’s actually pushing this asteroid off of its orbital path? It’s hard to say, but without going to sci-fi extremes, researchers suspect it could be good old-fashioned solar radiation pressure and thermal emission forces moving what is “likely a dehydrated asteroid” that has no water and hasn’t had any in a long time.
Japan’s Hayabusa2 spacecraft is currently en route to catch up with the rogue rock, with a rendezvous scheduled for July 2031.
The post A Mysterious Asteroid Is Accelerating Through Space, and Scientists Don’t Know Why appeared first on VICE.
