Asteroid named "Django"

Badlands918 · July 2009

Hello--I am a new member of this forum, and would like to introduce myself. My name is Ron Dyvig, residing in Quinn, SD, USA. I have been involved in many things in my life, but primarily consider myself as being a retired Astronomer and musician. Musically speaking, I've primarily played saxophone in regional weekend jazz bands over the years. As a longtime admirer of Django Reinhardt, I have also recently picked up guitar and am attempting to get into the Django groove...I may not live long enough to succeed, however, but am having great fun giving it a try.

My real reason of posting this to make the first public announcement that the International Astronomical Union (IAU) has announced that an asteroid has been officially named after Django Reinhardt. I am pleased to inform this group that it was discovered by myself at Badlands Observatory in 2001. You can get more detailed information about the official status of this by visiting the NASA site hosted by JPL in Pasadena, Ca.

http://ssd.jpl.nasa.gov/sbdb.cgi?sstr=Django&orb=1

I thank Djangobooks for allowing me to make the announcement on this forum. And, I encourage all others on this forum to share the information widely.

Respectfully,

Ron Dyvig
Badlands Observatory

rimm · July 2009

Great work mate-I find it hard using my digital tuner and you're off discovering asteroids.The question that everyone wants answered though of course is..will it destroy Earth? And if so, when???

Again, that really is a fantastic achievement

Badlands918 · July 2009

Thanks rimm. Django's asteroid will not pose any danger to Earth. It is a 3-5 Km diameter asteroid that has a very stable orbit located safely between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter. This is an area known as the Main Asteroid Belt. Interestingly, the work I have been doing for NASA is participation in their Spaceguard Program. The sole purpose of Spaceguard is to survey the solar system for potentially hazardous asteroids. Fortunately, no threatening asteroids have been found so far. ;-)