Tianwen-2 Enters Orbit of Asteroid Kamo’oalewa

Sample-return spacecraft Tianwen-2 will perform an orbit-insertion burn at asteroid 469219 Kamoʻoalewa on Sunday, June 7, 13 months after its launch in May 2025. It is expected to begin collecting samples early next month. https://www.techtimes.com/articles/317613/20260602/tianwen-2-asteroid-orbit-insertion-set-june-7-amateurs-decode-telemetry.htm

Kamoʻoalewa, formally designated 2016 HO3, was discovered in April 2016 by the Pan-STARRS 1 telescope operated at Haleakala Observatory in Hawaii. It is between 40 and 100 meters in diameter — roughly the size of a large building — and is the smallest asteroid ever to be visited by a spacecraft. The object occupies an unusual quasi-satellite orbit, looping around the Sun in a path that keeps it perpetually near Earth without being gravitationally captured by our planet. That stability will last only about three centuries before gravitational perturbations shift it elsewhere.

What makes Kamoʻoalewa a priority science target is its reflectance spectrum. Unlike most near-Earth asteroids, which tend toward carbonaceous or stony compositions, its spectrum closely resembles the lunar silicate material studied in NASA’s Apollo samples.