A Near-Earth asteroid (NEA 2005 YU55) will be making a close fly-by to Earth at 07:28 PHT, Wednesday, 9 November 2011(November 8 at 23:28UT). This dark, nearly spherical chunk of primordial space rock is around 400 metres in diameter and is goin to pass closer than the moon(0.85 lunar distance from the Earth).
It will approach the Earth from the sunward direction, and it will be a daylight object until the time of closest approach. A few hours after its close Earth approach, it will reach a visual brightness of 11th magnitude although it will not be visible to observers in the Philippines it will be a visible but challenging target to observers with optical and near-IR telescopes in the northern and southern hemispheres.
It is classified as a potentially hazardous object, although it poses no threat of an Earth collision(well at least not over the next 100 year).
So what would happen if it would hit earth?
If it would hit a country like the Philippines, it could destroy a city as large as whole Metro Manila. At its current angle and speed it could leave an approximated 1.2 mile crater which pretty much the size of Taal Volcano main crater lake which is 1.18 miles. It will cause regional extinction up to Batangas city.
If it would hit the waters it will cause tsunamis which will cause destruction upto halfway around globe.
But no worries, JPL has projected it will miss us by a good cosmic mile.
Below is the animation of this coming event. Please check the T-minus countdown from: http://events.slooh.com
It will approach the Earth from the sunward direction, and it will be a daylight object until the time of closest approach. A few hours after its close Earth approach, it will reach a visual brightness of 11th magnitude although it will not be visible to observers in the Philippines it will be a visible but challenging target to observers with optical and near-IR telescopes in the northern and southern hemispheres.
It is classified as a potentially hazardous object, although it poses no threat of an Earth collision(well at least not over the next 100 year).
So what would happen if it would hit earth?
If it would hit a country like the Philippines, it could destroy a city as large as whole Metro Manila. At its current angle and speed it could leave an approximated 1.2 mile crater which pretty much the size of Taal Volcano main crater lake which is 1.18 miles. It will cause regional extinction up to Batangas city.
If it would hit the waters it will cause tsunamis which will cause destruction upto halfway around globe.
But no worries, JPL has projected it will miss us by a good cosmic mile.
Below is the animation of this coming event. Please check the T-minus countdown from: http://events.slooh.com
UPDATE: NASA’s Deep Space Network antenna in Goldstone, California has captured new radar images of Asteroid 2005 YU55 as it begins its close pass by Earth.
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| This radar image of asteroid 2005 YU55 was obtained on Nov. 7, 2011. Credit: NASA/JPL/Caltech. |
The image above was taken on Nov. 7 at 11:45 a.m. PST (2:45 p.m. EST/1945 UTC), when the asteroid was approximately 1.38 million kilometers (860,000 miles) or about 3.6 lunar distances away from Earth.
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