Astronomers Mistake Elon Musk's Tesla Roadster for Near-Earth Asteroid

The Minor Planet Center retracted its asteroid designation after discovering the object was Musk's 2018 Falcon Heavy test payload.

On January 2, 2025, an amateur astronomer identified a near-Earth object labeled 2018 CN41, later classified as an asteroid by the Minor Planet Center (MPC).
Within 17 hours, the MPC retracted the designation after confirming the object was Elon Musk's Tesla Roadster launched in 2018 as part of SpaceX's Falcon Heavy test flight.
The Tesla Roadster, complete with a mannequin named 'Starman,' has been orbiting the Sun in an eccentric trajectory since its launch seven years ago.
This incident highlights the challenges of tracking artificial objects in space, as similar misidentifications have occurred with spacecraft like Rosetta and NASA's Lucy mission.
Astronomers emphasize the need for a centralized database to track artificial objects, as the growing number of space missions increases the likelihood of such errors.