Calendar
Categories:
Latest Articles:
Tag Cloud:
Stats:
- Entries = 82
- Notes = 34
General Links
Another Close Call
Node created on Red Electric Skywalker - Solar Moon :: 12.19.11.2.4
We may not have noticed, but last Thursday [Red Crystal Moon] afternoon an asteroid 100 feet in diameter, the size of a small office building, made the closest approach ever recorded to the Earth, missing us by one-tenth of the distance between here and the Moon. 
Credit: G. Masi and F. Mallia, SoTIE telescope
The latest asteroid, 2004 FH, was too small to cause widespread damage if it hit us, and like many asteroids, it would have been more likely to explode in the air. However, if this happens on a large enough scale, it can release particles that shade the sun, killing off plants and animals in a kind of nuclear winter.
The astronomers used the 14-inch (35.28-centimeter) SoTIE telescope in Las Campanas, Chile, as part of an educational project in Italy. They snapped a frame about every 31 seconds.
The asteroid, roughly 100 feet (30 meters) wide, soared to within 26,500 miles (43,000 kilometers) miles above the southern Atlantic Ocean at 5:08 p.m. EST, as predicted. That is just beyond geostationary weather satellites, which orbit at an altitude of 22,300 miles.
The space rock moved quickly, crossing from one side of the Moon's orbit to the other in just 31 hours. Scientists said 2004 FH would have been visible through binoculars to observers able to locate it.
Space artist Mark Garlick created this view of Earth from a frightening perspective.
"Our serene blue planet looms above the dusty horizon of an Earth-approaching asteroid, its surface cracked and strewn with boulders," Garlick said. "The image shows the Earth as it would appear from a dangerously close distance of about 40,000 kilometers [24,850 miles], well inside the orbit of the Moon and comparable to those of geostationary satellites."
Source: Space.com
An asteroid flew past Earth last week so close that it nearly entered an orbital halo where weather satellites roam. Scientists spotted it March 15 and watched it zoom by just three days later. It posed no threat, but there are hundreds of thousands more where that one came from.
And while asteroid 2004 FH, as it is known, was watched calmly by astronomers, a more frightening scenario unfolded two months earlier:
An unprecedented asteroid scare in January had astronomers worried for a few hours over a rock that had a 1-in-4 chance of hitting Earth during the next few days. At the time, some of the scientists were unsure who should be notified. The event has prompted NASA to set up a formal process for notifying top officials in the future of any impending impacts, SPACE.com has learned.
The plan, which has existed on an informal basis for months but was not known to all the key scientists involved, could be put out for review this summer and finalized by the end of the year.
The blueprint will be limited to spelling out lines of communication within NASA, but it might spur other governmental officials to begin considering how to respond to a threat from beyond if NASA administrator Sean O'Keefe were to be informed of one, said Lindley Johnson, the top official for Near Earth Object Observation at NASA Headquarters.
For now, there is no established chain of command to the White House in relation to possible asteroid impacts, nor is there any plan for what government agencies should do regarding possible evacuations or emergency preparations
Visit me @ http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/asteroid_warning_040322.html