Asteroid on Collision Course with Earth – Get the Latest Information
Certain asteroids pose a risk of colliding with Earth, while others hold the potential to unveil mysteries of the cosmos. Despite being situated in the distant asteroid belt, these ancient celestial bodies frequently approach Earth closely, traversing the planet at short distances. Such proximity can occur when an asteroid deviates from its intended path due to the gravitational force exerted by a massive planet. Additionally, their orbital paths may bring them remarkably near to Earth.
NASA’s Defense Coordination Office (PDCO), which is responsible for monitoring the skies and monitoring various Near-Earth Objects (NEOs), has issued a warning about an asteroid that will pass close to Earth today.
Asteroid 2023 OY4
NASA’s Center for Near-Earth Object Studies (CNEOS) has named this space rock Asteroid 2023 OY4. The asteroid will make its closest approach to Earth today, August 2, at a distance of just 1.2 million kilometers. Shockingly, it’s already hurtling toward Earth in orbit, traveling at about 63,475 kilometers per hour, just shy of the speed of a hypersonic ballistic missile.
Asteroid 2023 OY4 belongs to Apollo’s group of Near-Earth Asteroids, which are space rocks that bisect the Earth and whose semimajor axes are larger than the Earth’s axis. These asteroids are named after the huge 1862 Apollo asteroid discovered by German astronomer Karl Reinmuth in the 1930s.
Is Asteroid 2023 OY4 dangerous?
While not a planet killer, an asteroid that large can still cause serious damage. It’s about 96 feet wide, so it’s almost as big as an airplane. That’s bigger than the Chelyabinsk asteroid that exploded over the Russian city in 2013, injuring more than 1,000 people and damaging nearly 8,000 buildings.
Dinosaur Killing Asteroid – How It Happened
Asteroids have crashed into Earth time and time again and changed the course of history. One of the biggest events happened almost 65 million years ago when a large asteroid hit the earth and wiped out several species of dinosaurs! Although the impact crater, known as the Chicxulub crater, is buried under the Yucatan Peninsula in Mexico, hypotheses reveal how the impact occurred.
According to Alvarez’s hypothesis, the asteroid formed the planet, making it habitable for humans today, but likely caused the extinction of the dinosaurs. The collision would have caused the formation of huge tidal waves and an impact crater nearly 140 km wide. The impact would have caused Earth material to be spewed into space, which would have turned Earth into a nuclear winter-like environment.
