An asteroid that scratches the Earth with a hair’s breadth – a video showing its flyby

It was close – but our planet missed it with an asteroid, which was closer to us than the moon. You can watch the flyby in the video.

MUNICH – Asteroid 2023 EY approached Earth last Friday (March 17, 2023). It was closer to us than the moon. Asteroid impacts of similar size have injured people in the past. But this time it did not happen.

Asteroid Flying Near Earth – A video shows a flyby near Earth

Because: 2023 EY has raced across the Earth over 240,000 km. A distance corresponding to about two-thirds of the distance from the Earth to the satellite. However, things got exciting on Friday at 1.35am. Although the asteroid cannot be seen with the naked eye, it can be seen with the help of telescopes. Friday’s flight was seen online by the Virtual Telescope Project. The site uses images from an automated telescope in Serrano, Italy.

On March 13, 2023, EY was detected by an observatory in South Africa. This belongs to Atlas Network. This symbolizes the last asteroid collision alert system. Potential threats from space must be detected as quickly as possible by this system, so that Hollywood films like “Deep Impact” or “Armageddon”, in which millions of lives are in danger, remain fiction.

Ten years ago, a meteorite injured 1,500 people

high Science alert The diameter of the asteroid is about 16 meters. But even with that size, it can be dangerous: In 2013, a Chelyabinsk meteor entered the atmosphere and infected about 1,500 people in a sparsely populated region of Siberia with its shock wave and shattered window panes. At over 12,000 tons, it was the largest known meteorite in more than 100 years.

The smallest meteorite 2023 EY belongs to the Apollo asteroids, named after the 1862 Apollo asteroid, which was discovered by the German Karl Renmuth in the 1930s. (cgsc)

Speaking of space: a newly discovered comet is approaching Earth: the celestial body is likely to shine so brightly in October 2024 that it can be seen with the naked eye.