1566 Icarus - Definition and Overview

1566 Icarus is an Apollo asteroid (a sub-class of near-Earth asteroid) whose unusual characteristic is that at perihelion it is closer to the Sun than Mercury; it is said to be a Mercury-crosser asteroid. It is also a Venus- and a Mars-crosser.

Icarus flies past Earth every 19 years. The last time was in 1997. Often it comes as close as 6.4 Gm (4 million miles). It passed only 600,000 km (not quite twice as far as the Moon) from Earth in 1968.

It is named after Icarus of Greek mythology, who flew too close to the Sun. It was discovered in 1949 by Walter Baade.

Icarus in fiction

• Icarus is the setting for Arthur C. Clarke's short-story Summertime on Icarus (aka 'Icarus Ascending'), where an astronaut is stranded on the asteroid as it approaches perihelion.
• Icarus features in Kim Stanley Robinson's novel The Memory of Whiteness, in which the asteroid is inhabited by a religious cult that worships its close approaches to the Sun.
• An asteroid named Icarus plays a major role in Gregory Benford's classic science fiction novel In the Ocean of Night.