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From: Dave-Platt%LADC@CISL-SERVICE-MULTICS.ARPA (Dave Platt)
Newsgroups: net.space
Subject: Charon and Chiron
Message-ID: <8601102100.AA01506@s1-b.arpa>
Date: Fri, 10-Jan-86 16:23:00 EST
Article-I.D.: s1-b.8601102100.AA01506
Posted: Fri Jan 10 16:23:00 1986
Date-Received: Sat, 11-Jan-86 07:45:01 EST
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Organization: The ARPA Internet
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Re the "tenth planet" discovered between Saturn and Uranus... I believe
that it is actually called Chiron, rather than Charon.  Charon, as
David Smith correctly points out, is Pluto's moon.

Chiron was discovered a few years ago, and (if my foggy memory is
correct) there was a good deal of discussion at the time as to whether
it deserves to be called a small planet, a large asteroid, or a
"planetoid" (somewhere between the two).  I believe that the latter
designation was the one generally accepted... but I'm not sure.  Does
anyone out there have any additional information?

I do recall that Chiron is far too small to cause the orbital variations
that have been detected in the outer planets... it's smaller than Pluto.