2173 Maresjev is a Main-belt asteroid that was discovered August 22, 1974 by L. V. Zhuravleva at the Crimean Astrophysical Observatory. Its diameter is 17 km.
It was named in honor of Alexej Petrovich Maresjev, the protagonist in the novel Story about a True Man (also translated as Story of a Real Man) by Boris Polevoi.[1]
[2] The story, which was never substantiated as fact, was an immensely popular Russian book that was eventually made into an opera. It was first published in English in 1952, and was reprinted in 1970.
The asteroid was scheduled to occult a 9.5 magnitude star in the Taurus constellation November 27, 2008 for a period of 1.3 seconds. During the event, their combined light was to drop to 16.0 magnitude, which is the magnitude of the asteroid.[3]
Zhuravleva is ranked 43 in Harvard's ranking of those who discovered minor planets. She discovered 200 such bodies, 13 of which were co-discoveries, between 1972 and 1992.[4]
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