An asteroid is going to blow past Earth tomorrow closer than the moon’s orbit.
The asteroid, named 2014 DX110, will pass within about 9/10th of the moon’s orbit at around 33,000 miles per hour. The Virtual Telescope Project is planning to provide live online coverage of the asteroid’s passing starting around 3:30 p.m. eastern time tomorrow.
The asteroid is believed to be the size of three double decker busses.
The asteroid is classified as a “Apollo class” asteroid, meaning that it passes through the Earth’s orbit. If the asteroid were to strike Earth, it would leave a crater up to 20 times its size.
If that were to happen, it would throw enough dust into the sky that it would darken the planets for years.
Almost six months after a previously record breaking asteroid strike on the moon, the moon has once against been hit with the biggest space rock it’s collided with in history.
NASA and other space scientists have released footage of the strike to the public after extensive analysis of the September 11, 2013 strike.
The meteor, which scientists estimate at 880 pounds and measured almost four and half feet wide, hit the moon at 37,900 miles per hour. The impact of the rock caused a crater around 130 feet wide and had the strength of 15 tons of TNT.
It was more than three times as powerful as the previous record set on March 17, 2013.
The strike also created a blast that could be seen on Earth with the naked eye. Also, where post strikes produce a flash that lasts a fraction of a second, the strike on September 11th lastest eight seconds. NASA said it was the longest lasting flash in recorded history.
They make blockbuster movies about asteroids this size.
An asteroid the size of three football fields is set to make a close brush with Earth Monday night. The near-Earth asteroid, known as 2000 EM26, will not hit the planet but will pass close enough to be seen clearly by orbiting cameras.
Scientists say the asteroid is flying at 27,000 miles per hour and will pass about 8.8 lunar distances from Earth. (A lunar distance is the space between the Earth and the moon or approximately 238,900 miles.)
Operators of the Slooh Space Camera are using the arrival of the asteroid to raise awareness of the fact many asteroids are not found until they are days away from the planet.
“We continue to discover these potentially hazardous asteroids — sometimes only days before they make their close approaches to Earth,” said Paul Cox, Slooh’s technical and research director. “Slooh’s asteroid research campaign is gathering momentum with Slooh members using the Slooh robotic telescopes to monitor this huge population of potentially hazardous space rocks. We need to find them before they find us!”
The fly by comes almost exactly a year after an asteroid exploded over Chelyabinsk, Russia, with the energy equivalent of 20 atomic bombs. On that day, scientists were focused on another near-Earth object’s passing, 2012 DA14, and did not notice the space rock that exploded over Russia.
NASA will be streaming video of the asteroid’s passing starting around 9 p.m. Eastern time on their website space.com.
What appears to be a meteor flash turned the nighttime skies over Argentina as bright as day on Sunday. Amateur video shows the green streak and flash in the background of a concert setting.
Earth is experiencing an unusual cosmic bombardment as four large asteroids pass it in just one day. Fortunately astronomers don’t seem to be joking when saying none are expected to pose danger. Continue reading →
A ball of light that may have been a meteor streaking across the night sky sparked reports of sightings up and down the eastern U.S. seaboard, officials say. Continue reading →
NASA chief Charles Bolden has advice on how to handle a large asteroid headed toward New York City: Pray. Continue reading →
Excitement continues to rise among both professional and amateur astronomers about Comet ISON, which on Nov. 28 of this year might become one of the brightest comets ever seen, outshining such recent dazzlers as Comet Hale-Bopp (1997) and Comet McNaught (2007).
Fortunately, Comet ISON was discovered 14 months before this perihelion passage — its closest point to the sun — while still distant and faint, thus giving observers time to plan. Another major advantage is that this fine object will be favorably placed for viewing, first in the morning sky before perihelion passage on Nov. 28, and then both in the morning and evening sky afterward.
