Asteroid hurtling towards Earth

An asteroid with an estimated diameter of 350 to 780 meters is hurtling towards Earth. According to NASA, the giant rock is moving at a speed of 37,400 kilometers per hour. So it will enter Earth’s orbit on Thursday.

Asteroid 418135 (2008 AG33) is considered “dangerous”. NASA classifies all objects in this category that lie within 7.5 million kilometers of Earth or less. The closest point from Earth that the asteroid is expected to reach is 3.2 million km. That’s relatively close from a cosmic perspective, roughly eight times the average distance between Earth and the Moon.

418135 (2008 AG33) rushes through the Earth at more than thirty times the speed of sound, and disaster does not occur. But a second giant asteroid will follow in a few weeks. 467460 (2006 JF42) has a width of 380 to 860 meters and travels at a speed of 40,700 kilometers per hour.

China wants spacecraft to collide with asteroids in the event of a disaster

The asteroid, which could be twice the size of the Empire State Building and is now heading toward Earth on Thursday, was first spotted in 2008 and last flew near the blue planet on March 1, 2015. It passes the near-Earth region every seven years. When an asteroid threatens to strike Earth, astronomers at space agencies around the world work to distract it.

Until now, it was not necessary to use missiles, for example. China’s space agency is in the early stages of planning planetary transformation strategies. In the event of an imminent disaster, the intent is to collide a spacecraft with an asteroid, according to the Daily Mail, for example.