The automation at Shenton Park Observatory was put to the test after a period of inactivity this week with several important NEO confirmations and follow up observations:
2010 HA
D21 was the first site to confirm this object some 4 hours after its discovery by E12 on April 16, and was subsequently followed by our sister site 926 at Tenagra Observatories.
An Aten type object, 2010 HA has a diameter estimated between 35 and 70m. At the time of our observations it was about 8.4 million km fro Earth at magnitude 19 and moving at about 2.2 degrees per day.
The MPEC can be found here.
2010 HF
Moving at some 17 degrees per day, 2010 HF was observed by D21 on April 19 which provided some additional astrometry for the MPEC announced shortly after.
The Amor type object is currently at closest approach near opposition at about magnitude 16 and with an estimated diameter of 20m.
2010 GH65
At a predicted magnitude of 19.9, Paulo’s detection of this very faint object from observations made at D21 were accomplished by stacking a dozen 300s images. The ability for D21 to track unguided for extended exposures, together with Paulo’s stacking techniques have allowed us to stalk an increasingly fainter group of targets with this modest-sized instrument under very challenging skies.
Our observations nearly doubled the observed arc for 2010 GH65 discovered by WISE on April 11.
2010 GH 65 is an Amor type object, with an unusually large diameter estimated between 450 and 700m.