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This image shows the asteroid Dinkinesh and its satellite as seen by the Lucy Long-Range Reconnaissance Imager (L’LORRI) as NASA’s Lucy Spacecraft departed the system. This image was taken at 1 p.m. EDT (1700 UTC) Nov. 1, 2023, about 6 minutes after closest approach, from a range of approximately 1,010 miles (1,630 km). From this perspective, the satellite is revealed to be a contact binary, the first time a contact binary has been seen orbiting another asteroid. NASA/Goddard/SwRI/Johns Hopkins APL

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This image shows the asteroid Dinkinesh and its satellite as seen by the Lucy Long-Range Reconnaissance Imager (L’LORRI) as NASA’s Lucy Spacecraft departed the system. This image was taken at 1 p.m. EDT (1700 UTC) Nov. 1, 2023, about 6 minutes after closest approach, from a range of approximately 1,010 miles (1,630 km). From this perspective, the satellite is revealed to be a contact binary, the first time a contact binary has been seen orbiting another asteroid. NASA/Goddard/SwRI/Johns Hopkins APL
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Fraser Cain (fraser@m.universetoday.com)'s status on Tuesday, 07-Nov-2023 20:12:23 UTC Fraser Cain

When NASA's Lucy mission made its first flyby of asteroid Dinkinesh last week, it made the surprising discovery of a tiny moonlet. Well, hold onto your hats; a new picture from Lucy is mindblowing. That moonlet is two tiny moons gently resting side by side. This configuration is known as a contact binary, and it's very common in the Solar System, but we've never seen one up close like this and never orbiting another asteroid. If only Lucy could stick around.
https://science.nasa.gov/missions/lucy/nasas-lucy-surprises-again-observes-1st-ever-contact-binary-orbiting-asteroid/

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