A planet the size of a school bus has advanced towards our path, but despite swinging much closer than many satellites orbiting the Earth, the space rock should zoom safely by Thursday, NASA says.
The newly discovered asteroid will come within 13,000 miles of Earth, scientists said this week. The closest approach will be to the southeastern Pacific Ocean on Thursday morning.
Once it is gone, the planet will not return to Earth’s neighborhood until 2041.
Scientists estimate the planet to be between 15 and 30 feet. By asteroid standards, it is considered punitive. Asteroids of this size hit the Earth’s atmosphere and burn every two or three times, said Paul Chodas, director of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory’s Center for Near-Earth Object Studies. Of these tiny asteroids there could be as many as 100 million.
Significantly larger asteroids are a real threat. The good news is that this is easier said than done.
Asteroid 2020 SW, as it is known, was discovered last Friday by the Catalina Sky Survey at the University of Arizona in Tucson.
