Mathilde is a C-type asteroid that was discovered by Austrian astronomer Johann Palisa at Vienna Observatory on 12 November 1885.  It has dimensions 66 × 48 × 46 km, and an orbit semi-major axis distance of 2.6484 AU and eccentricity of 0.265.  Mathilda has a notably slow rate of rotation, requiring 17.4 days to complete a 360° revolution about its axis.  Mathilde was visited by the NEAR Shoemaker spacecraft during June 1997, on its way to asteroid 433 Eros, passing within about 1200 km of the asteroid at a relative speed of 9.93 km/s.

Manually created by RChen to complete mission NEAR

253 Mathilde Information Page

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