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Who discovered Charon?

Created from Britannica articles using AI. AI can make mistakes, so verify using Britannica articles.

Charon was discovered on June 22, 1978, by astronomers James W. Christy and Robert S. Harrington.12

The discovery was made using photographic images of Pluto recorded at the U.S. Naval Observatory station in Flagstaff, Arizona. The astronomers were attempting to obtain more accurate measurements of Pluto's orbit when they identified the moon as an unresolved bump on the side of the dwarf planet.12