469219 Kamoʻoalewa
near-Earth asteroid and quasi-satellite of Earth
469219 Kamoʻoalewa (; provisional designation 2016 HO3) is a very small Apollo-type near-Earth asteroid approximately 27.4 meters (90 feet) in diameter. It is an elongated object that rapidly rotates every 28 minutes. At present it is a quasi-satellite of Earth, and currently the second-smallest, second-closest, and second most stable known such quasi-satellite (after 2023 FW13).
Kamoʻoalewa was discovered by Pan-STARRS at Haleakala Observatory on 27 April 2016. It is the target of the China National Space Administration's Tianwen-2 mission, which arrived at the asteroid on July 4, 2026 and is intended to orbit the object for nine months before retrieving samples from the surface and returning them to Earth in 2027.
The object's Earth-like orbit, proximity to the Earth–Moon system, higher spectral reddening relative to other asteroids, and similarity to space weathered lunar materials indicate that it is likely lunar ejecta. However, it might also be an S-type or L-type asteroid. Despite being most similar to weathered Apollo 14 and Luna 24 Lunar Mare soils, it is suggested to be from the lunar far-side highland crust crater, Giordano Bruno.
Orbital similarities suggest it is likely a co-orbital pair with 2000 WN10 or a broken up set including the other NEOs 2020 KZ2, 2020 PN1, and 2020 PP1.
Discovery and naming
Kamoʻoalewa was first spotted on 27 April 2016, by the Pan-STARRS 1 asteroid survey telescope on Haleakalā, Hawaii, that is operated by the University of Hawaii's Institute for Astronomy and funded by NASA's Planetary Defense Coordination Office.
“469219 Kamoʻoalewa” enters the record as near-Earth asteroid and quasi-satellite of Earth. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Kamoʻoalewa, near-Earth and asteroid can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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This entry incorporates text from “469219 Kamoʻoalewa” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.