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Asteroidal occultation observations have rapidly increased in number since they were first attempted in the late 20th century, with more than 3,000 observers participating over the last 30 years. The technique does not depend upon the asteroid being visible, yet provides measurement of an asteroid’s size and shape at the 1km level, and astrometry of an asteroid in the order of milli-arcsecs for main belt asteroids, and 10’s of micro-arcsecs for trans-Neptunian objects, TNOs. Peripheral results include the discovery of rings around Uranus, Neptune, and the asteroids Chiron, Chariklo and Haumea; the detection of the bilobal nature of Arrokoth before the New Horizons’ flyby; measurement of Pluto’s atmospheric properties at high altitudes better than New Horizons; and detection of double stars with separations between 0.2 mas and 100 mas. Asteroidal occultation results are being used by The Minor Planet Center, and JPL Horizons, to compute accurate asteroid orbits; by the relevant Gaia team to verify the Gaia measurements of asteroid positions; and by the Japanese space agency for an accurate orbit and size of the Geminid meteor shower parent body (3200) Phaethon, for the Destiny mission due to launch in 2024. A team with time allocation on the JWST to record occultations by TNOs has asked for assistance with predictions. |
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