1566 Icarus

Infobox Planet | discovery=yes | physical_characteristics = yes | bgcolour=#FFFFC0
name=1566 Icarus
discoverer=Walter Baade
discovered=June 27, 1949
alt_names=1949 MA
mp_category=Apollo asteroid,
Mercury-crosser asteroid,
Venus-crosser asteroid,
Mars-crosser asteroid
epoch=July 14, 2004 (JD 2453200.5)
semimajor=161.257 Gm (1.078 AU)
perihelion=27.923 Gm (0.187 AU)
aphelion=294.590 Gm (1.969 AU)
eccentricity=0.827
period=408.778 d (1.12 a)
inclination=22.854°
asc_node=88.090°
arg_peri=31.290°
mean_anomaly=124.422°
avg_speed=22.88 km/s
dimensions=1.4 km
mass=2.9×10¹² kg
density=2 ? g/cm³
surface_grav=0.000 39 m/s²
escape_velocity=0.000 74 km/s
rotation=0.094 71 d
spectral_type=U
abs_magnitude=16.9
albedo=0.4 [ [http://cdsads.u-strasbg.fr/cgi-bin/bib_query?1989AJ.....97.1211V Radiometry of near-earth asteroids ] ]
single_temperature=~242 K

1566 Icarus (pronEng|ˈɪkərəs "ik'-ə-rəs") is an Apollo asteroid (a sub-class of near-Earth asteroid) whose unusual characteristic is that at perihelion it is closer to the Sun than Mercury; it is said to be a Mercury-crosser asteroid. It is also a Venus and Mars-crosser. It is named after Icarus of Greek mythology, who flew too close to the Sun. It was discovered in 1949 by Walter Baade.

Icarus makes a close approach to Earth at gaps of 9, 19, or 38 years. Rarely, it comes as close as 6.4 Gm (16 lunar distances and 4 million miles), as it did on June 14, 1968. The last close approach was in 1996, at 15.1 Gm, almost 40 times as far as the Moon. [ [http://neo.jpl.nasa.gov/cgi-bin/db?name=1566 Page Modified ] ] The next close approach will be June 16, 2015, at 8.1 Gm (5 million miles).

In 1967, Professor Paul Sandorff from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology gave his students the task to devise a plan to destroy Icarus in the case that it was on a collision course with Earth. This plan is known as Project Icarus [Project Icarus, MIT Report No. 13, MIT Press 1968, edited by Louis A. Kleiman. "Interdepartmental Student Project in Systems Engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Spring Term, 1967".] (which was the basis for the 1979 science fiction film Meteor, starring Sean Connery).

Icarus in fiction

:"See Asteroids in fiction."

References

External links

* [http://newton.dm.unipi.it/cgi-bin/neodys/neoibo?objects:Icarus;main NeoDys Object Listing: orbital elements and list of close approaches]
* [http://www.thespacereview.com/article/175/1 Article on TheSpaceReview.com about Project Icarus]

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