[ad_1]
An asteroid the size of a refrigerator will approach Earth on November 2, the day before the US presidential election. About this on Instagram written by American astrophysicist Neil DeGrasse Tyson.
According to him, the asteroid 2018VP1, a huge space rock, “is hurtling towards us at a speed of more than 25 thousand miles per hour.” The scientist suggested that a space body can touch the Earth, but will not cause harm. “So if the end of the world comes in 2020, it won’t be the universe’s fault,” he summarized.
According to NASA, asteroid 2018VP1 will approach Earth at a minimum distance on November 2 at approximately 6:33 PM Moscow time. It will fly 384 thousand kilometers from Earth. The chance of an asteroid entering Earth’s atmosphere is only one in 240, or 0.41 percent.
The asteroid was not identified as “potentially dangerous”, since computer simulations of its trajectory did not show the inevitability of a future collision with our planet. It was last seen on November 16, 2018.
Potentially Hazardous Astronomical Objects (POAOs) are asteroids or comets that are close to Earth and can cause great damage in a collision. The encounter is understood as the closest passage to the planet at a distance of less than 19.5 lunar. In the case of 2018VP1, the distance between Earth and the asteroid will be approximately one lunar distance. Currently, more than two thousand POAOs are known, while 38 asteroids may pose a threat in the next hundred years.
Each year several approaches are made at a distance equal to the distance from the Earth to the Moon. However, only a few objects are detected before the time of the approach (generally within 24 hours), so there is an unaccounted risk of collision. Additionally, some objects enter the atmosphere when detected by the detonation sensors of nuclear devices. The power of the blast is usually between one and 10 kilotons, which is comparable to the blast energy of a nuclear bomb during World War II.
Such an unknown object was, for example, the Chelyabinsk meteorite, whose diameter reached 20 meters. It was not discovered by specialists until the moment it entered the atmosphere. At an altitude of 30 to 70 kilometers, an explosion occurred with a capacity of 500 kilotons of TNT equivalent, which is comparable to the explosion of the Ivy King nuclear device in 1952. Although the shock wave reached the surface, the impact from the meteorite did not cause serious damage.
The most dangerous asteroid is (144898) 2004 VD17, with a diameter of about one kilometer. In the event of a fall, a crater with a diameter of 10 kilometers will appear and cause an earthquake of magnitude 7.4. However, the probability of a collision with it is low, and in 2102, when convergence occurs, it will be 1 in 58.8 million.
[ad_2]
