It’s been an interesting week, and now we have some unusual news from the world of astronomy. A body discovered in 1906 and thought for more than a century to be an asteroid now looks like a comet. It may not be one — but it seems to have developed a halo and a tail. Monday evening, astronomer Steve Larson from the Catalina Sky Survey (CSS) in Arizona was first to notice a plume from (596) Scheila. This may simply be dust and ice scattered as the result of a collision with a meteor. Serennu shows Scheila’s current location at 22+ Leo, completing a grand fire trine with the Sun and Eris.
Scheila was discovered Feb, 21, 1906 by A. Knopf in Heidelberg, Germany, and was named in honor of a friend of his. The same year, the first motion picture was produced and Mahatma Gandhi created the term Satyagraha — loosely translated as ‘Soul Force’, or ‘holding on to truth’, and which is a philosophy and practice of nonviolent resistance. We know it was the Satyagraha theory that influenced Nelson Mandela’s struggle in South Africa under apartheid, Martin Luther King, Jr.’s campaigns during the civil rights movement in the United States, and other social justice and similar movements throughout the world.
Scheila made a close approach to Jupiter’s orbit in November 2008 — right when Obama was elected president.
The name Scheila, or the more standard English version — Sheila — originated from the Gaelic word for ‘blind’. The physical metaphor of someone or something blind — like justice — being struck by a meteor and as a result, providing light in the darkness may be an apt exclamation point on the already crowded and mostly benefic sky over Mr. Assange’s judicial proceedings. And maybe, even over us. In mythology, blindness is sometimes associated with the gift of prophesy.