It's "Near Miss Day" tomorrow.
A large asteroid will pass closer to Earth than the moon!
Asteroid 2005 YU 55 will pass at 23:28 GMT, about 322,000km (201,000 miles) from us - visible from the northern hemisphere, but too dim for the naked eye and too fast for the Hubble Space Telescope.
It's the first time since 1976 that an object of this size has got this cosy to Earth. The orbit and position of the 385m (1,300ft.) asteroid are well known, and there's no chance it'll hit us – though let's face it: if it was going to, we couldn’t do a damn thing about it! And a rock the size of four playing fields could hurt! A meteoroid hit the moon in May 2006, with the equivalent of 4 tons of TNT: that one was only 25cm (10 inches) and travelling 38km/s (85,000 mph), yet it left a crater 14m wide and 3m deep. YU 55 is travelling slower at 13km/s (30,000 mph) but note the size difference...
The boffins reckon YU 55's been visiting Earth for thousands of years but, because gravitational tugs from the planets occasionally tweak its path, they're not sure how long the asteroid has been in its present orbit. Computers plotting the asteroid's path for the next 100 years show there's no chance of impact.
Previous studies show the asteroid, which is blacker than charcoal, is probably composed of carbon-based materials and some silicate rock. This pass gives scientists a rare chance for study without having to go through the time and expense of launching a probe. NASA tells me an event like this won't happen again until 2028 when Asteroid 2001 WN5 will pass even closer...
Japan plans to launch a 2018 asteroid sample return mission. NASA is working on a mission to return soil samples from an asteroid in 2020, followed by a human mission to another asteroid in the mid-2020s.
Hmmm, will Bruce Willis still be up to it by then...?
PS: 08 Nov.2011 - A little scaremongering from NZHerald...
PS: 08 Nov.2011 - Eyes peeled for another space object this week...
A large asteroid will pass closer to Earth than the moon! Asteroid 2005 YU 55 will pass at 23:28 GMT, about 322,000km (201,000 miles) from us - visible from the northern hemisphere, but too dim for the naked eye and too fast for the Hubble Space Telescope.
It's the first time since 1976 that an object of this size has got this cosy to Earth. The orbit and position of the 385m (1,300ft.) asteroid are well known, and there's no chance it'll hit us – though let's face it: if it was going to, we couldn’t do a damn thing about it! And a rock the size of four playing fields could hurt! A meteoroid hit the moon in May 2006, with the equivalent of 4 tons of TNT: that one was only 25cm (10 inches) and travelling 38km/s (85,000 mph), yet it left a crater 14m wide and 3m deep. YU 55 is travelling slower at 13km/s (30,000 mph) but note the size difference...
The boffins reckon YU 55's been visiting Earth for thousands of years but, because gravitational tugs from the planets occasionally tweak its path, they're not sure how long the asteroid has been in its present orbit. Computers plotting the asteroid's path for the next 100 years show there's no chance of impact.
Previous studies show the asteroid, which is blacker than charcoal, is probably composed of carbon-based materials and some silicate rock. This pass gives scientists a rare chance for study without having to go through the time and expense of launching a probe. NASA tells me an event like this won't happen again until 2028 when Asteroid 2001 WN5 will pass even closer...
Japan plans to launch a 2018 asteroid sample return mission. NASA is working on a mission to return soil samples from an asteroid in 2020, followed by a human mission to another asteroid in the mid-2020s.
Hmmm, will Bruce Willis still be up to it by then...?
PS: 08 Nov.2011 - A little scaremongering from NZHerald...
PS: 08 Nov.2011 - Eyes peeled for another space object this week...
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