[ad_1]
The asteroid, dubbed by NASA Asteroid 2019 AR2, will make the so-called "Earth Approach". Asteroid orbit calculations predict that the space rock will reach its closest distance to Earth in just a few hours. NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) expects Asteroid AR2 to drop around 9:28 pm on Sunday, Jan. 13. The unexpected flyby occurs only 10 days after the space rock was first detected by NASA radars on January 3.
And during today's overfly, the asteroid is estimated to pass Earth at a vertiginous speed of more than 10,780mph (4.82km per second).
Luckily, NASA does not expect space rock to hit Earth so soon.
Instead, the asteroid will lose Earth in nearly two million kilometers.
But the asteroid is large enough and will sway close enough for NASA to pay close attention on its journey around the solar system.
CONSULT MORE INFORMATION: Rogue asteroids can eliminate life on Earth, warns Stephen Hawking
JPL estimates that the Asteroid AR2 measures something in the range of 121.4 feet and 268 feet (37m and 82m) in diameter.
An asteroid of this size is about ten times longer than a red two-story London bus and is 1.45 times higher than the Leaning Tower of Pisa.
Even at the lower end of the estimate, the asteroid is nine times larger than a Volkswagen Beatle car.
And asteroids much smaller than AR2 are known to cause chaos and destruction by reaching Earth.
CONSULT MORE INFORMATION: Impact of asteroids will & # 39; wipe the third of a lifetime & # 39; in the land
The latest example is the Chelyabinsk Meteor 2013, which erupted in the Chelyabinsk region of Russia six years ago.
The 20-meter-wide meteor remained undetectable until it entered the Earth's atmosphere and injured more than 1,5000 people when it blew windows in a wide beam.
NASA has nicknamed the terrifying incident of a "cosmic alert" to the dangers lurking in deep space.
The US space agency said: "The explosion released more than 30 times the energy from the atomic bomb that destroyed Hiroshima."
Today, Asteroid AR2 will lose Earth at about 0.01954 astronomical units (au) or 1.8 million miles (2.92 million km).
That's roughly the equivalent of 7.60 times the distance between Earth and Moon.
Because of the distances involved, NASA called the Near-Earth Object Asteroid AR2.
NEOs are described as any asteroid or comet that pass the Sun within 1.3 astronomical units or 120.8 million miles (194.4 million km).
NASA said, "Near-Earth Objects (NEOs) are comets and asteroids that have been pushed by the gravitational pull of nearby planets in orbits that allow them to enter the Earth's neighborhood."
[ad_2]
Source link