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Beware! An asteroid is heading for Earth today at blistering speed. Know what NASA says about this space rock.
Asteroids have been flying by Earth closely all year. Last month alone witnessed nearly 40 asteroids passing by and October is set to follow the trend as more than 7 asteroids have already passed by Earth closely. NASA’ Planetary Defense Coordination Office has classified all these asteroids as “Potentially Hazardous Objects” due to the close proximity with which they pass by Earth. Now, another one is on its way to Earth today.
Asteroid 2022 SM21 details
According to NASA, Asteroid 2022 SM21 is already on its way towards the planet, travelling at a staggering speed of 54216 kilometers per hour. The asteroid will make its closest approach to Earth today, October 4, at a distance of just 1.86 million kilometers.
According to theskylive.com, asteroid 2022 SM21 is currently 1.89 million kilometers away from Earth, which is equivalent to 0.012636 Astronomical Units. Light takes 6.3053 seconds to travel from Asteroid 2022 SM21 and arrive to us. An astronomical unit (AU, or au) is basically a unit of length equal to the average, or mean, distance between Earth and the Sun, that is, 149,597,870.7 kilometers.
NASA currently has a NEO Observations Program in place to track, and characterize at least 90 percent of the NEOs that are 140 meters or larger in size. Most of the asteroids are observed with the help of the NEOWISE Project which repurposed NASA’s Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer to work as a survey telescope and scan the sky for Near-Earth Objects. NASA JPL also uses a variety of ground-based telescopes in the hunt for these asteroids.
Did an asteroid terraform Mars?
According to a research paper, recently published in the Geophysical Research Letters by Stephen Mojzsis and Ramon Brasser, a celestial body the size of Ceres dwarf planet collided with Mars and broke away a part of its Northern Hemisphere, leaving behind a deposit of rich minerals. The debris left after the collision slowly came together to form the two moons – Phobos and Deimos. According to the study, the rich minerals account for 0.8 percent of Mars.
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