/biz/ - Business & Finance

>>55091299
Sorry about continuing the gravity theme, but there is one very cool thing you might want to hear about: asteroid (66391) 1999 KW4. It's an Aten-type potentially hazardous asteroid with a diameter of 1.6 km. It is a binary asteroid, hasving a small satellite approximately 360 meters in size, orbiting the primary at a distance of 2.6 km. A shape model from radar observations is pic related.

Among other bizarre properties, the equatorial regions of Alpha are very close to breakup: releasing a particle one meter above the surface at the equator would put it into orbit. As seen in the image, the gravitational effects between the moon and the asteroid create a ring mountain along the equatorial plane around the entire asteroid.

I can imagine sitting on the highest peak on the equator, lifting a pebble above my head, letting go of it, and it will stay there in an orbit. How cool is that? This means that an average-sized man could not stand up on the surface and sit again, because his center of mass would be in orbit.