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| NOT.THE.REAL ASTEROID. STOCK PHOTO FROM FREEDIGITALPHOTOS |
I thought this would be interesting stuff for all of us earthlings. An asteroid will zoom “within spitting distance of Earth net week,” which NASA says is the the “closest flyby ever predicted for an object this large.” The asteroid, named 2012 DA 14, was discovered by astronomers last year. It will just be around 17,200 miles above Earth’s surface when it speeds up. That is practically outside the Earth’s atmosphere, but closer than the orbit of most weather and communication satellites.
NASA says though that despite the close shave, there is nothing to fear. More on this at Near impact: asteroid to narrowly miss Earth | ABS-CBN News.
But then, the asteroid will keep coming back every year and astronomers cannot guarantee that there will be no impact on one of its flybys.
Interestingly, the 2012 DA14 is just one of the 500,000 known rocks circling around our little planet. Experts predict there are many more.
International governments are reportedly rumored to be in talks on how to deflect one if it was on a collision course with us.
Like in one of the movies I saw, one proposal would be to knock it off course by flying rockets at it.
video from www.mirror.co.uk
It has been believed that an asteroid wiped out the dinosaurs 65 million years ago.
I try not to bother thinking about asteroids – baka ma-praning ako kakaisip! haha 🙂 But it would really be interesting to know who or what agency in the world is in charge of finding out if the Earth is at risk of another collision, and then what to do about it.
i think anything found in space will always be surreal to me.
What an interesting post! I guess we can't just "pick up and move", can we? Hmmm… Thanks for sharing! Reia from http://www.southcountrysides.blogspot.com
it will be stranger than fiction when we follow how bruce willis save the earth in armaggedon. hehehe
I try not to think about things like that. Just worry what's at present as what God says in the bible.
Still scary though the thought of it hitting the surface of the earth.. Let's just always pray and be prepared
Every now and then news like this always comes up. Am not scared anymore, after all we'll all be hit anyway. LOL
That was really close. It was even a quarter of moon's distance from earth. still a bit scary.