NASA discloses information on Asteroid passing Earth today with potential risks
NASA has announced that an asteroid, known as Asteroid 2020 FM6, is currently en route and its orbit may bring it in close proximity to Earth today. The Defense Coordination Office (PDCO) of NASA, responsible for monitoring celestial bodies like Near-Earth Objects (NEOs), detected this space rock. NASA employs advanced technological equipment to observe and monitor NEOs, including asteroids and comets.
The asteroid passes the planet at a distance of about 5.9 million kilometers and accelerates already at 57099 kilometers per hour, which is even faster than a hypersonic ballistic missile!
Other details
Asteroid 2020 FM6 has been declared a “potentially hazardous object” by NASA. These are celestial bodies that are larger than 492 feet in diameter and pass Earth closer than 7.5 million kilometers. Size-wise, the asteroid is nearly 500 feet across! Thus, it meets both requirements and has been considered a potentially hazardous asteroid.
The space agency has also revealed that Asteroid 2020 FM6 belongs to Apollo’s group of Near-Earth Asteroids, which are Earth-splitting space rocks with semi-major axes 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.
According to NASA, asteroid 2020 FM6 first passed Earth on October 24, 1964, at a distance of about 973,070 kilometers. After today, it will next pass closer to Earth on April 27, 2063, when it will come as close as 5.8 million kilometers to Earth.
The largest asteroid collision of all time
Throughout Earth’s rich 4.6 billion-year history, there have been several knock-on effects that have changed its course. One of the most notable incidents was the asteroid impact that triggered the extinction of the dinosaurs, but it is not the largest asteroid to ever hit Earth. This title relates to an asteroid impact that occurred more than 2 billion years ago and resulted in the 300 km wide Vredefort crater near Johannesburg, South Africa. However, according to a recent study, an even bigger asteroid impact took place.
Scientists at the University of New South Wales (UNSW) have now discovered the largest asteroid crater ever to hit the planet, located beneath the surface in New South Wales, Australia, according to research published in the journal Tectonophysics. The Deniliquin structure, which is nearly 520 kilometers wide, surpasses the largest previously known asteroid crater called Vredefort, which was about 300 kilometers wide.
