Discovery and Observations
Ida was discovered on 29 September 1884 by Austrian astronomer Johann Palisa at the Vienna Observatory. It was his 45th asteroid discovery. Ida was named by Moriz von Kuffner, a Viennese brewer and amateur astronomer. In Greek mythology, Ida was a nymph of Crete who raised the god Zeus. Ida was recognized as a member of the Koronis family by Kiyotsugu Hirayama, who proposed in 1918 that the group comprised the remnants of a destroyed precursor body.
Ida's reflection spectrum was measured on 16 September 1980 by astronomers David J. Tholen and Edward F. Tedesco as part of the eight-color asteroid survey (ECAS). Its spectrum matched those of the asteroids in the S-type classification. Many observations of Ida were made in early 1993 by the US Naval Observatory in Flagstaff and the Oak Ridge Observatory. These improved the measurement of Ida's orbit around the Sun and reduced the uncertainty of its position during the Galileo flyby from 78 to 60 km (48 to 37 mi).
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