An Asteroid the Size of 2 Football Fields Launches to Earth, The Impact is 1,000 Times Nuclear Bombs

FLORIDA – A asteroid which is wider than two football fields will slide past Earth on Thursday, August 4, 2022 in the morning United States (US) time. NASA astronomers discovered the asteroid, known as 2022 OE2, just days ago, on July 26, 2022.

The stout space rock is estimated to be between 170 and 380 meters long, which is about twice the width of an American football. Astronomers also confirmed that 2022 OE2 is an Apollo class asteroid, meaning it orbits the sun and crosses Earth’s orbital path.

Quoted from SINDOnews from the Live Science page, Thursday (4/8/2022), the asteroid 2022 OE2 is expected to pass Earth at a distance of about 5.1 million kilometers, more than 13 times the average distance between Earth and the moon. In this context, the asteroid is significantly further away than the asteroid 2022 NF, which is only 56,000 miles or 90,000 km, or about 23% of the average distance between Earth and the moon on July 7.

Also read; 2 Asteroids The Size of a Skyscraper Shoots Near Earth, NASA Continues To Monitor Its Movement

NASA monitors tens of thousands of near-Earth objects like this and has estimated the trajectory of all of them beyond the end of the century. Astronomers know about 15,000 such asteroids. The impact of an asteroid of this size would release more energy than 1,000 nuclear bombs.

The good news is, Earth is not in danger of a catastrophic asteroid impact for at least the next 100 years. However, astronomers realized that a small change in trajectory, such as a collision with another asteroid or the gravitational tug of a planet, could change the asteroid’s orbital path and have the potential to wreak havoc on Earth.

Therefore, NASA takes the defense of planet Earth against the threat of asteroids very seriously. In November 2021, NASA launched an asteroid deflection mission called the Dual Asteroid Diversion Test, in which a spacecraft will hit the 160-meter-wide asteroid Dimorphos in the fall of 2022.

Also read; NASA Successfully Launches DART, 7 Million Mile Mileage Mission Hits Asteroid Dimorphos

The collision won’t destroy the asteroid, but it may slightly change the orbital path of the space rock. The mission will help test the feasibility of asteroid deflection, should some future space rock pose an imminent danger to planet Earth.

(Web)

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