Asteroid pass close call for Earth
Source: Agencies |
February 16, 2013, Saturday
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A 45-METER asteroid hurtled toward Earth's backyard yesterday, set to make the closest known flyby for a rock of its size.
NASA, the US National Aeronautics and Space Administration, promised the asteroid was going to miss Earth by 27,600 kilometers, avoiding catastrophe. But that was still closer than many communication and weather satellites; scientists insisted these, too, were going to be spared.
Asteroid 2012 DA14, as it was called, was too small to see with the naked eye even at its closest approach around 1925GMT, over the Indian Ocean near Sumatra.
As asteroids go, DA14 was a shrimp. The one that wiped out the dinosaurs 65 million years ago was 9.7 kilometers across. But this rock would have done immense damage had it struck, releasing the energy equivalent of 2.4 million tons of TNT and wiping out 1,950 square kilometers.
Scientists were certain it would not impact Earth. And chances were extremely remote for it to run into any of the satellites orbiting 36,000 kilometers up.
Most of the solar system's asteroids are situated in a belt between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter, and remain stable there for billions of years. Some occasionally pop out, though, into Earth's neighborhood.
The flyby provided a rare learning opportunity for scientists eager to keep future asteroids at bay - and an advertisement for those wanting to boost preventive measures.
"We are in a shooting gallery and this is graphic evidence of it," said former Apollo astronaut Rusty Schweickart, chairman emeritus of the B612 Foundation, committed to protecting Earth from dangerous asteroids.
Schweickart noted that 500,000 to 1 million sizable near-Earth objects - asteroids or comets - are out there. Yet less than 1 percent - which is fewer than 10,000 - have been inventoried.
NASA, the US National Aeronautics and Space Administration, promised the asteroid was going to miss Earth by 27,600 kilometers, avoiding catastrophe. But that was still closer than many communication and weather satellites; scientists insisted these, too, were going to be spared.
Asteroid 2012 DA14, as it was called, was too small to see with the naked eye even at its closest approach around 1925GMT, over the Indian Ocean near Sumatra.
As asteroids go, DA14 was a shrimp. The one that wiped out the dinosaurs 65 million years ago was 9.7 kilometers across. But this rock would have done immense damage had it struck, releasing the energy equivalent of 2.4 million tons of TNT and wiping out 1,950 square kilometers.
Scientists were certain it would not impact Earth. And chances were extremely remote for it to run into any of the satellites orbiting 36,000 kilometers up.
Most of the solar system's asteroids are situated in a belt between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter, and remain stable there for billions of years. Some occasionally pop out, though, into Earth's neighborhood.
The flyby provided a rare learning opportunity for scientists eager to keep future asteroids at bay - and an advertisement for those wanting to boost preventive measures.
"We are in a shooting gallery and this is graphic evidence of it," said former Apollo astronaut Rusty Schweickart, chairman emeritus of the B612 Foundation, committed to protecting Earth from dangerous asteroids.
Schweickart noted that 500,000 to 1 million sizable near-Earth objects - asteroids or comets - are out there. Yet less than 1 percent - which is fewer than 10,000 - have been inventoried.
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