The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) has said that a truck-sized asteroid will come ‘extraordinarily’ close to the Earth and zoom past it, making the closest approach to a heavenly planet. The space agency has emphasized that the asteroid passing near the Earth poses no threat to human life.
“It’s not going to break,” said NASA’s David Farnocchia. If it had entered the Earth’s orbit, it would have turned into a ball of fire but this time it will not happen. “Some of them may come really close to Earth, and some of them may never come close to Earth,” he said.
Asteroid 2023 BU was discovered by an amateur astronomer. According to NASA, it will zoom past the southern tip of South America at about 4:27 p.m. PST on Thursday (0027 GMT Friday).
It will be closest to Earth’s surface when it is 3,600 km from the planet, which is still much closer than many geostationary satellites orbiting the planet. It will not hit the earth so there is no danger of it coming off.
Even if this were to happen, an asteroid 3.5–8.5 m (11–28 ft) in diameter would largely disintegrate in Earth’s atmosphere, resulting in some small meteorites.
The asteroid was discovered by Gennady Borisov, an amateur astronomer from an observatory in Crimea. He was the first to see the interstellar comet in 2019.
NASA’s Scout impact risk assessment system quickly determined that the asteroid would miss Earth, the US space agency said.
“Despite very few observations, it was able to predict that the asteroid will make an exceptionally close approach to Earth,” said David Farnocchia of NASA, who helped develop Scout. known near-Earth object ever recorded.”
(with inputs from agencies)
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