Asteroid 2001 FO32 is closest to Earth, giving astronomers a chance to study the rock as it passes.
The largest asteroid to pass Earth this year has reached its closest approach and is not a threat of a cataclysmic collision, but gives astronomers a rare opportunity to study a rock formed during the dawn of our solar system.
The asteroid was two million kilometers (1.25 million miles) away at its closest, according to NASA – more than five times the distance between the Earth and the Moon, but still close enough to be classified as a “potentially dangerous asteroid.” .
NASA tracks and catalogs such objects that could potentially collide with Earth and cause massive destruction, such as the massive asteroid that wiped out 75 percent of life on the planet 66 million years ago.
Asteroid 2001 FO32, discovered 20 years ago, was too far to be so dangerous, even when it reached its closest point to Earth at around 2:00 p.m. GMT on Sunday, according to the Paris Observatory. NASA said it was traveling at about 124,000 km / h (77,000 mph).
“Oh yes, friends! Do you see this bright spot? This bright point is the asteroid, ”exclaimed astrophysicist Gianluca Masi of the Italy-based Virtual Telescope Project, which pointed its lenses at the rock just after the closest approach on Monday.
“How happy I am, how proud I am, how excited I am… to bring this to you live,” Masi said while showing a grainy image of a pale dot during a YouTube broadcast.
Get those telescopes ready! On March 21, Asteroid 2001 FO32 will safely pass Earth, allowing astronomers to get a good look at a relic of the beginnings of our solar system.
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Read more about asteroids near Earth in the STI repository https://t.co/6G1tNpnvNR pic.twitter.com/SNraoMWKRj
– NASA STI Program (@NASA_STI) March 18, 2021
Astronomers hoped to gain a better understanding of the composition of the estimated 900-foot rock as it zoomed by.
“When sunlight hits the surface of an asteroid, minerals in the rock absorb some wavelengths while reflecting others,” NASA said.
“By studying the spectrum of light that bounces off the surface, astronomers can measure the chemical ‘fingerprints’ of the minerals on the asteroid’s surface.”
Because of its elongated trajectory, NASA said it “picks up speed as a skateboarder rolls down a halfpipe, then slows down after throwing back into deep space and swinging back toward the sun.”
Possible Threats
The study of asteroids and comets that come so close to our planet – called Near-Earth Object or NEO – gives scientists a better understanding of the history and dynamics of the solar system.
It’s also a valuable database of potential threats – a massive rock impact from space could devastate the entire planet.
According to NASA, about 80 to 100 tons of material such as dust and small meteorites fall to Earth every day, which is not a serious threat, but larger objects can cause great destruction because they have tremendous momentum due to their high speed.
In 2013, an object nearly 60 meters wide exploded over the Russian city of Chelyabinsk, unleashing 30 times the force of the atomic bomb dropped over Hiroshima during World War II.
Experts estimate that such events occur once or twice a century, and that larger objects are even rarer.
NASA has said that more than 95 percent of near-Earth asteroids the size of 2001 are FO32 or greater, and none of them have any chance of affecting our planet in the next century.
The agency is studying possible ways to thwart an asteroid or comet impact, including slamming spacecraft to divert it and even nuclear explosions as a last resort.