Discovery date 7 December 1980 Discovered 7 December 1980 Asteroid family Vesta family | Observation arc 23355 days (63.94 yr) Orbits Sun | |
Alternative names 1980 XW; 1962 WV1;
1969 UD; 1972 OA Minor planet category Main belt (Vesta family) Aphelion 2.65710 AU (397.497 Gm) Perihelion 2.04260 AU (305.569 Gm) Discovered by Purple Mountain Observatory Named after Purple Mountain Observatory Discovery site Purple Mountain Observatory Similar Asteroid belt, Sun, 306 Unitas | ||
3494 Purple Mountain is a small asteroid in the asteroid belt. It is not purple; its unusual name comes from the Purple Mountain Observatory in China, where it was rediscovered in 1980, as it had been seen but lost several times since 1962. (See lost asteroids.)
Purple Mountain is a vestoid, a fragment blasted off the giant asteroid 4 Vesta by the impact that formed the Vestian collisional family. A spectroscopic analysis showed it to have a composition very similar to the cumulate eucrite meteorites.
References
3494 Purple Mountain Wikipedia(Text) CC BY-SA