International Asteroid Day is observed every year on June 30. The day aims to raise public awareness about the asteroid impact hazard and to inform the public about the crisis communication actions to be taken at the global level in case of a credible near-Earth object threat.
International Asteroid Day is a United Nations-sanctioned day to raise public awareness of the risks of asteroid impacts.
The mission behind International Asteroid Day is to educate the public about the risks and opportunities of asteroids year-round by hosting events, providing educational resources and regular communications to our global audience on multiple digital platforms.
Asteroid Day: History And Significance
Asteroid Day was co-founded by astrophysicist and famed musician Dr Brian May of the rock group Queen, Apollo 9 astronaut Rusty Schweickart, filmmaker Grig Richters, and B612 Foundation President Danica Remy, to educate the public about the importance of asteroids.
They co-founded Asteroid Day to educate the public about the role of asteroids in the formation of our solar system, their impact in space resources and the importance of defending Earth from such impacts.
Asteroid Day is observed annually on June 30 to mark the date of Earth's largest asteroid impact recorded in history, the Siberia Tunguska event.
The Tunguska event was an enormous explosion that occurred on June 30, 1908, at an altitude of five to ten kilometres, flattening around 2,000 square kilometres, and charring more than 100 square kilometres of pine forest near the Podkamennaya Tunguska River in central Siberia, Russia.
In December 2016, the United Nations General Assembly adopted a resolution declaring June 30 as International Asteroid Day in order to "observe each year at the international level the anniversary of the Tunguska impact over Siberia, Russian Federation, on June 30, 1908, and to raise public awareness about the asteroid impact hazard".
Based on a proposal by the Association of Space Explorers, the General Assembly's decision was made, the UN said on its website.
International Asteroid Day 2022: Theme
This year, the theme for International Asteroid Day is "small is beautiful". This means that asteroids are indeed small but to the eyes of those who study them, the boulder-strewn surfaces are beautiful to see close-up.
On the occasion of International Asteroid Day, asteroid experts will meet at Luxembourg to take part in a four-hour programme of panels and interviews where they will share small but beautiful samples of asteroids and meteorites. These include the samples of asteroid Ryugu returned to Earth in 2020 as part of Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency's (JAXA) Hayabusa2 mission.