Astronomers who announced the discovery of a new near-Earth asteroid were stunned to realize that the supposed space rock was the remains of Elon Musk's red Tesla Roadster and its spacesuited driver, "Starman."
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The object, which was launched into space on a SpaceX rocket in 2018, highlights a growing problem in astronomy that could lead to costly errors, researchers say.
On January 2, the International Astronomical Union’s Minor Planet Center (MPC) added a new object, dubbed 2018 CN41, to its list of near-Earth asteroids. The supposed space rock was identified by an unnamed amateur astronomer in Turkey using years of publicly available data, Astronomy.com. However, just 17 hours later, the MPC issued an editorial retraction of the discovery after the citizen scientist realized they had made a mistake.
The “asteroid” Tesla Roadster, previously used by Elon Musk, was launched into space on February 6, 2018, as the test payload for the maiden launch of Falcon Heavy . The publicity stunt attracted widespread attention at the time, in part because of Starman – a mannequin in the car seat wearing a possibly defective spacesuit.
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The car and its driver were headed to Mars after escaping Earth's gravity and were supposed to enter a stable orbit around the Red Planet, which raised alarms at the time that it could become a potential "biohazard" to Mars if it accidentally landed there. However, the pair overshot their target and instead entered a stable orbit around the sun. It now circles the sun and occasionally passes by Mars.
The Tesla Roadster has now completed about 4.5 trips around the sun, traveling at about 45,000 mph, according to whereisroadster.com. That means the car has now exceeded its original 36,000-mile warranty about 100 times.
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However, the car is probably unrecognizable now, having been exposed to years of intense radiation from the sun and bombarded by tiny fragments of space rocks, which have likely stripped away the car's outer layers and shattered Starman.
Source: livescience
