Earth's temporary asteroid friend last year was a chunk of its real moon that had been blasted into space thousands of years ago, scientists find.

For a brief, but exciting, time last year, Earth had two moons. A small asteroid lingered close to our planet in its orbit around the Sun, temporarily caught by Earth’s gravity to become a far away mini-moon. A closer look at the space rock reveals a rather familiar origin: Earth’s mini-moon might actually be a broken-off piece of our regular Moon.

Last year, astronomers on the hunt for potentially dangerous near-Earth asteroids spotted something unusual. A space rock, now dubbed 2024 PT5 made several close passes by Earth, not quite orbiting our planet,

A near-Earth object was likely ejected into space after an impact thousands of years ago. Now it could contribute new insights to asteroid and lunar science.

The sun’s light exerts a tiny force called “solar radiation pressure” on objects in space. Lightweight human-made debris, like hollow rocket parts, gets pushed around more easily, like a tin can in the wind. Natural objects like asteroids are much denser and less affected.

Typically, asteroids - like the one depicted in this artist's concept - originate from the main asteroid belt between the orbits of Mars