6002 Eetion

Eetion discovered on 8 September 1988, by Danish astronomer Poul Jensen at the Brorfelde Observatory near Holbæk, Denmark,^[1] who on very same night also discovered the Jupiter trojan (5119) 1988 RA1, and several other main-belt asteroids including (9840) 1988 RQ₂, (12689) 1988 RO₂, (14364) 1988 RM2, (14837) 1988 RN₂, and (24664) 1988 RB₁.

Eetion is a dark Jovian asteroid in a 1:1 orbital resonance with Jupiter. It is located in the trailering Trojan camp at the Gas Giant's L₅ Lagrangian point, 60° behind its orbit (see Trojans in astronomy).^[3] It is also a non-family asteroid of the Jovian background population.^[4]

It orbits the Sun at a distance of 4.7–5.7 AU once every 11 years and 11 months (4,361 days; semi-major axis of 5.22 AU). Its orbit has an eccentricity of 0.09 and an inclination of 16° with respect to the ecliptic.^[2] A first precovery was taken at Palomar Observatory in September 1953, extending the body's observation arc by 35 years prior to its official discovery observation at Brorfelde.^[1]

This minor planet was numbered by the Minor Planet Center on 23 June 1994 (M.P.C. 23661).^[8] On 29 November 2021, IAU's Working Group for Small Bodies Nomenclature named it from Greek mythology after King Eetion of Thebe Hypoplakia, father of Andromache, and father-in-law of Hector. Eetion was killed during the raid on Thebe by Achilles.^[1][9]

This Jupiter trojan is an assumed, carbonaceous C-type asteroid.^[7]

Rotation period

In February 1993, Eetion was observed by astronomers Stefano Mottola and Mario Di Martino with the ESO 1-metre telescope and its DLR MkII CCD-camera at La Silla in Chile. The photometric observations were used to build a lightcurve showing a rotation period of 12.918±0.022 hours with a brightness variation of 0.18±0.01 magnitude (U=3-).^[6] It was the body's first determined rotation period in literature.^[6]: 29

Diameter and albedo

According to the survey carried out by NASA's Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer with its subsequent NEOWISE mission, Eetion measures 40.4 kilometers in diameter and its surface has an albedo of 0.075,^[5] while the Collaborative Asteroid Lightcurve Link assumes a standard albedo for a carbonaceous asteroid of 0.057 and calculates a diameter of 42.23 kilometers, based on an absolute magnitude of 10.6.^[7]

• Asteroid Lightcurve Database (LCDB), query form (info Archived 16 December 2017 at the Wayback Machine)
• Discovery Circumstances: Numbered Minor Planets (5001)-(10000) – Minor Planet Center
• Asteroid (6002) 1988 RO at the Small Bodies Data Ferret
• 6002 Eetion at AstDyS-2, Asteroids—Dynamic Site
  • Ephemeris · Observation prediction · Orbital info · Proper elements · Observational info
• 6002 Eetion at the JPL Small-Body Database
  • Close approach · Discovery · Ephemeris · Orbit diagram · Orbital elements · Physical parameters