It was discovered on 13 May 1971, by Dutch astronomer couple Ingrid and Cornelis van Houten at Leiden Observatory, on photographic plates taken by Dutch–American astronomer Tom Gehrels at the Palomar Observatory in California.
It orbits the Sun in the outer main-belt at a distance of 2.7–3.4 AU once every 5 years and 4 months (1,952 days).
Gehrels used Palomar's Samuel Oschin telescope (also known as the 48-inch Schmidt Telescope), and shipped the photographic plates to Cornelis and Ingrid van Houten at Leiden Observatory where astrometry was carried out.
[10] A photometric lightcurve of Calandra obtained at the Palomar Transient Factory in California in 2011, gave a rotation period of 5.2427±0.0036 hours with a brightness variation of 0.58 magnitude (U=2).
[11] The approved naming citation was published by the Minor Planet Center on 2 February 1999 (M.P.C.