CBS Detroit – There is a video on Youtube that says that we are about to have another “very close encounter” with an asteroid. What the California Jet Propulsion Laboratory calls “Near Earth Objects” or NEO. Now keep in mind that asteroids have approached or hit our planet for millions of years, and many do so on a daily basis. Most asteroids and debris in space, as you may recall from science class, burn in the atmosphere, caused by air friction when objects hit the atmosphere at many thousands of miles per hour.
However, a YouTube video says that an asteroid named “2018 VP1”, which is approximately 6 feet in diameter, will pass within approximately 300 miles of our planet on November 2, 2020. However, some experts say there is no nothing left to fear. First there is the math, the asteroid “2018 VP1” is projected to hit 0.02 times the distance from Earth to the moon. Since the moon is 239,000 miles away, 0.02 equals 4,780 miles. Now you’re thinking it’s far away, right? What is the problem? Well, when they calculate these things through orbital mechanics, they use the center of the celestial body, in this case, the earth. The land is 7,917 miles wide, and half is 3,958 miles. That’s where the video correctly gets its 300-mile estimate, or a drive from Detroit Metro to Sault Sainte Marie at UP to put it in perspective.
In a recent Mlive article, astronomer Mike Murray says that while this is very close, it is not as bad as it sounds. JPL assigns a trust number or condition code to NEOs from 0 to 9. “0” is very trusted and 9 is very uncertain. The asteroid “2018 VP1” has a score of 7, which means that the projected forecast is uncertain. Part of that is because in 2018 they observed this for 21 days and only formed an orbital arc for 13 days. Murray says that even if this rock were hit to hit a target in the ground, it is only 6 feet wide. It would have to be 20 times bigger to harm a city.
On February 15, 2013, the Chelyabinsk meteorite entered the Earth’s atmosphere over Russia over the southern Ural region. This asteroid was 11 times larger than “VP1 2018” at 66 feet wide and was shared on social media everywhere as it looked brighter than the sun and was visible up to 62 miles away. The Chelyabinsk meteorite exploded about 97,000 feet in midair with the force of 400-500 kilotons of TNT, or 26-33 times the energy of the “Little Boy” atomic bomb that fell on Hiroshima. The atmosphere absorbed most of that explosion and people were injured by the broken windows of nearby buildings. It ended up exploding into a burst of air into many pieces. Astronomer Mike Murray says “VP1 2018” would likely break or explode like the Chelyabinsk meteorite and most of those impacting Earth.
So for now, the experts and the video point out that, for now, we are safe. Since we don’t know all the facts about this asteroid’s orbit, but as “VP1 2018” gets closer, hopefully astronomers will be able to acquire it for further measurements and to know for certain the orbit of this asteroid.
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