Surat: A couple of class 10 students have come across a near-Earth asteroid slated to fly past Earth in a remarkable discovery. The asteroid has now been named HLV2514 by NASA. The incredible discovery by the two girls from Surat — Vaidehi Vekariya Sanjaybhai and Radhika Lakhani Prafulbhai, was part of an international campaign that was undertaken to spot the astronomical object.
The two girls are students of a CBSE school — PP Savani Chaitanya Vidya Sankul ended up with the young students discovering the asteroid near the planet Mars. They made the discovery as a part of a 2 month science program at their school.
NASA acknowledged their rare find and sent across a confirmation mail for the same. The mail has since been viral and Indians all over have hailed the two girls’ discovery.
What was the science programme about?
The two-month science programme that these girls took part in was conducted by Space India in collaboration with International Astronomical Search Collaboration (IASC) and Hardin Simmons University in Texas.
The post has received many good wishes and congratulations for the girls. We wish them all the best for more such future discoveries.
The students used the Pan Starrs advanced telescope in Hawaii which has high-grade CCD cameras, and a higher field of view for their asteroid discovery.
Space India issued a “discovery alert” on Facebook on Friday to inform people about the discovery.
“We are proud to announce that two Girls from Surat with the help of SPACE-All India Asteroid Search Campaign discovered a new Asteroid which is a Near-Earth Object,” it stated.
PNN/Agencies