Bus-Size Asteroid Gives Earth Super-Close Shave Today, Second in 2 Days
For the second day in a row, a space rock is going to zip close by Earth within the orbit of the moon, and you can watch the encounter live online.
The 33-foot-wide (10 meters) near-Earth asteroid 2014 EC will come within 34,550 miles (55,600 kilometers) of Earth's surface this evening (March 6) — just 14 percent of the distance between our planet and the moon, which is about 239,000 miles (385,000 km) on average.
2014 EC, which was discovered just Tuesday (March 4), is about half as wide as the asteroid that exploded over Russia in February 2013, injuring about 1,500 people. There is no danger that 2014 EC will hit Earth on this pass, researchers stress; the chances that it will ever strike the planet are currently estimated at 1 in 2.7 million.
The flyby of 2014 EC follows closely on the heels of another space rock encounter. On Wednesday (March 6), the 100-foot-wide (30 m) asteroid 2014 DX110 zoomed by Earth, passing inside the orbit of the moon at a range of 217,000 miles (350,000 km).
No comments:
Post a Comment