An asteroid that orbited near Earth for a few months as a mini-moon may be a chunk of the moon that was blasted off by an impact thousands of years ago.

Earth's temporary asteroid friend last year was a chunk of its real moon that had been blasted into space thousands of years ago, scientists find.

New research suggests that Earth's recent mini-moon might have originated as part of our actual moon long, long ago.

For a brief, but exciting, time last year, Earth had two moons. A small asteroid lingered close to our planet in its orbit around the Sun, temporarily caught by Earth’s gravity to become a far away mini-moon. A closer look at the space rock reveals a rather familiar origin: Earth’s mini-moon might actually be a broken-off piece of our regular Moon.

A small asteroid, referred to as Earth's temporary "mini-moon," could actually be a piece of the Moon that broke away thousands of years ago. The celestial object, called 2024 PT5, is about 10-meter wide and poses no threat of collision with Earth now or in the near future, thanks to its trajectory.

A near-Earth object was likely ejected into space after an impact thousands of years ago. Now it could contribute new insights to asteroid and lunar science.