Space Object Named After Wayuu Rain God
From Times Staff and Wire Reports
Venezuelan astronomers led by physicist Ignacio Ferrin have named a Kuiper Belt object on the fringes of the solar system after Huya, the rain god in Venezuela’s indigenous Wayuu culture.
The frozen clump of rock, known as 2000 EB173, was discovered in March 2000 in the Kuiper Belt, a ring of icy debris that orbits the sun beyond Neptune. It takes 256 years to make one revolution.
Under guidelines set by the International Astronomical Union, such an object must be named after a mythological god.
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