An asteroid 160 meters in diameter, larger than 10 buses side by side, will pass close to Earth this Wednesday, June 28, NASA reported.
The Center for the Study of Near-Earth Objects (CNEOS, for its acronym in English), belonging to NASA, is tracking the rock 2013 WV44, which travels at the incredible speed of 11.8 kilometers per second.
This is 34 times the speed of sound.
But, Is there a risk of it crashing into our planet? Should we fear?
No. Asteroid 2013 WV44, discovered by Pan-STARRS 1 will be 7.5 million kilometers from Earth: although it is classified as close to our planet, it is definitely does not represent any danger.
atsuo asami, Japanese astronomer, explained that although 2013 WV44 “is not a potentially dangerous asteroid, It’s relatively big.”
アポロ型地球近傍 #小惑星 2013 WV44 が2023年6月28日18時07分頃(JST)に地心から約349万km(月までの距離の約9倍)まで接近します.この小惑星は2013年11月に米国,ハワイのPan-STARRS 1, Haleakalaで発見, 推定直径は71-160mです. PHAではありませんが比較的大きな天体です. https://t.co/UjdcCMX9SP pic.twitter.com/roeCu87YUI
— Atsuo ASAMI 浅見敦夫 (@AsamiAtsuo) June 20, 2023
What is a potentially dangerous asteroid and why is 2013 WV44 not, according to NASA?
An asteroid is potentially dangerous if it is found within 0.05 astronomical units of Earth and is more than 140 meters in diameter.
Although the asteroid that will visit us this Wednesday is large, It is not within the distance established as dangerous for our planet.
“NEOs (near-Earth objects) are comets and asteroids that have been pushed by the gravitational attraction of planets close to orbits, that allow them to enter the neighborhood of Earth, ”explains NASA.
Rocky asteroids form in the inner Solar System, between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter.
“Scientific interest in comets and asteroids is largely due to their status as relatively undisturbed remains of the process of formation of the Solar System, about 4,600 million years ago ”, highlights the North American aerospace agency.
So let’s get on with our lives we have nothing to worry about.