Digital Desk: The number of asteroids passing by Earth has grown recently. Another asteroid roughly the size of an aeroplane is now on its way to Earth and will make its closest approach today, August 28, according to a warning from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA).
The NEO
2022 QP3 asteroid will pass Earth today at about 9:55 pm UTC, or 3:25 am IST,
according to NASA's CNEOS. This asteroid, which is 100 feet wide, could pass by
the Earth by 5.51 million kilometres.
The
asteroid has been classified as a "possibly hazardous object" by the
Planetary Defence Coordination Office of the US space agency because to its
vicinity. It is 19.5 times further away than the moon. The asteroid's velocity
is 7.93 km/s, according to CNEOS.
Meanwhile,
this comes after a 100-foot-diameter asteroid NEO 2022 QQ4 whizzed past Earth
on Saturday. It was 5.93 million kilometres from our planet when it made its
closest approach. As per NASA's CNEOS, the giant asteroid moved at a speed of
7.23km per second.
Huge
space rocks called asteroids revolve around the Sun. However, they are
occasionally able to change their trajectory and even collide with them due to
the planets' gravitational pull.
Although incredibly remote, this
fear of possibly fatal asteroids has led NASA to launch its DART (Double
Asteroid Redirection Test) spacecraft. The DART mission is a project for
planetary defence in which the US space agency will fire a spacecraft directly
into the core of an asteroid to divert it from its course.
Later this year, as part of the
test, DART will crash into its intended target, which is not travelling in the
direction of the planet.
