NASA says a “potentially hazardous” asteroid is heading towards Earth, but is it time to worry?
We are only a week away from another major asteroid approaching Earth, and NASA has classified it as a “potential hazard.” The near-Earth asteroid is named Asteroid 138971 (2001 CB21) and is estimated to have a diameter of 3,940 feet, making it larger than the world’s tallest building, the Burj Khalifa. The giant asteroid is expected to approach its closest point to Earth on March 4, 2022, at 02:59 ET. NASA’s Center for Near-Earth Object Studies (CNEOS) reports that it is expected to travel at over 26,800 miles per hour. But does this massive asteroid, which is classified as a “potential hazard”, pose a danger to Earth?
Well, news of a dangerous asteroid approaching Earth could make anyone anxious, given the terrifying destructive power it possesses due to its size and speed. But the good news is that despite its massive structure and lightning speed, it poses no danger to Earth. In fact, the asteroid isn’t even expected to come any closer than 3 million miles from Earth, which is roughly 12 times the distance between our planet and the Moon. So you don’t have to worry too much about that. So why is it classified as “dangerous”?
In fact, NASA’s Center for Near-Earth Object Studies tracks asteroids that could potentially collide with Earth. NASA has tracked nearly 1,000 asteroids passing near Earth since 1968. When an asteroid more than 150 meters in diameter approaches Earth, NASA classifies it as a potentially hazardous asteroid and monitors it closely. Because of this, NASA classifies asteroid 138971 (2001 CB21) as potentially dangerous, and has received a lot of attention. The cause for concern stems from the fact that although the asteroid is on its way to pass unscathed, but if its direction is changed for any reason by something unforeseen, nothing will happen – maybe even head straight for Earth.
Last January, Gianluca Massi, an astronomer with the Virtual Telescope Project in Italy, captured this image of the giant asteroid when it was more than tens of millions of miles away. Now, as the asteroid approaches Earth, Massey has been able to take photos of another asteroid, this time about 6.2 million miles from our planet. Look here:
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You can see a sharp white dot in the image indicated by the white arrow in the center which is the next giant asteroid. “The telescope tracks the apparent motion of the asteroid, so it appears as a sharp point, with the surrounding stars appearing to be slightly elongated,” astronomer Gianluca Massi said on his website. He also stated that the image was taken from a single 120-second exposure shot taken remotely using PlaneWave’s 17-inch robotic telescope unit.
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