Asteroid The Size Of A Stadium Is Approaching Earth's Orbit
NASA has reported that a stadium-sized asteroid, 2003 AY2, termed a potentially hazardous object, will approach the Earth on June 22. Four other smaller asteroids will pass by the planet this week.
Multiple asteroids are hurtling towards the Earth this week. However, there is no reason to panic as they will only pass close to the Earth. The asteroids include a stadium-sized one, which will pass by the Earth on June 22, according to NASA.
The US Space Agency's Jet Propulsion Laboratory estimates that the largest asteroid among these, known as 2003 AY2, is 366 metres (1,200 feet) across and will approach the Earth within 60 lakh kilometres, terming it as a 'potentially hazardous object'.
Four other space rocks will also skim past the planet. On June 16, asteroid 2025 HN6, which is almost the size of an aeroplane, will fly by Earth at a safe distance of 2,440,000 km, posing no threat to the Earth. On June 17, a building-sized asteroid, measuring 162 meters (530 feet) across, called 2000 LF3, will make its closest approach and has also been designated as potentially hazardous. Two aeroplane-sized asteroids will pass by on June 18 and 19, respectively.
The Lowell Observatory Near-Earth-Object Search (LONEOS), a project designed to discover asteroids and comets that orbit near the Earth, first discovered the asteroid 2003 AY2 on January 2, 2003. Nothing is known about its physical properties other than its absolute magnitude, as per NASA.
NASA always closely monitors large space objects like these. The agency is known to use a system called the Asteroid Watch Dashboard to monitor the date of closest approach, approximate object diameter, relative size and distance from Earth for each encounter.
An object larger than about 150 meters that can approach the Earth within 4.6 million miles (7.5 million kilometres or 19.5 times the distance to the moon) is termed a potentially hazardous object.
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