Asteroid
Vesta
A giant asteroid spinning every five hours and twenty minutes.
Vesta is the second most massive body in the asteroid belt, orbiting the Sun every 3.6 years. It spins quickly, once every 5.34 hours. A huge ancient impact carved a crater nearly as wide as Vesta itself.
How it moves
- Vesta orbits the Sun every 1,325 days (about 3.6 years) at about 2.36 AU.
- Its orbit has an eccentricity of 0.090 and an inclination of 7.14 degrees.
- It rotates once every 5.342 hours.
- The Vesta family of asteroids, which share similar orbits, is probably debris from the impact that carved the Rheasilvia crater.
Facts
- Mean radius
- 261.38 km
- Mass
- 2.590e+20 kg
- Rotation period
- 5.3421276 hours
- Orbital period
- 1,325.39 days
- Average distance from the Sun
- 2.36137 AU
- Eccentricity
- 0.0902
- Discovered
- March 29, 1807, by Heinrich Wilhelm Olbers at Bremen
Vesta's Rheasilvia crater is about 500 km wide, some 95% of the asteroid's mean diameter.
Sources: ssd-api.jpl.nasa.gov, science.nasa.gov