The largest asteroid to pass by Earth this year will approach within some 1.25 million miles (two million kilometers) of our planet on March 21, NASA said Thursday.
The US space agency said it will allow astronomers to get a rare close look at an asteroid.
The asteroid, 2001 FO32, is estimated to be about 3,000 feet in diameter and was discovered 20 years ago, NASA said.
Tired of ads? Want to support our progressive journalism? Click to learn more.
"We know the orbital path of 2001 FO32 around the Sun very accurately," said Paul Chodas, director of the Center for Near Earth Object Studies. "There is no chance the asteroid will get any closer to Earth than 1.25 million miles."
Re: Planets, Comets, Asteroids, etc.
Posted: Thu Mar 11, 2021 9:07 pm
by PaulG
JPL has a great site you can use to look at the data about asteroids. Here's the link for 2001 FO32. I like to look at the close approach data, if only to see how often the asteroid comes round. Some come by every couple of years, unlike this one which seems to go all over the place.
They say that almost all the "planet killer" sized asteroids have been found and are being tracked. Still there is a huge number of tiny ones. A great site to see all this is NEO Earth Close Approaches. Given that the asteroid names are assigned based on when the asteroid is spotted, you can see how many of the asteroids are spotted when they are only a few weeks out. Way more are spotted only after they have already passed. And of course some are never spotted at all, like recent one over Vermont and the one in the Cotswolds.
Re: Planets, Comets, Asteroids, etc.
Posted: Sat Mar 20, 2021 2:23 pm
by tencats
Space oddity Oumuamua probably shard of Pluto-like world, scientists say
17 Mar 2021 | https://www.theguardian.com/science/202 ... ntists-say
Interstellar visitor likely made of frozen nitrogen, cookie-shaped rather than cigar, and not a comet or asteroid – while some stick to alien theory
Our solar system’s first known interstellar visitor is neither a comet nor asteroid as first suspected and looks nothing like a cigar. A new study says the mystery object is likely a remnant of a Pluto-like world and shaped like a cookie.
Arizona State University astronomers report the strange 45-metre (148ft) object appears to be made of frozen nitrogen, just like the surface of Pluto, and Neptune’s largest moon, Triton.
The study’s authors, Alan Jackson and Steven Desch, think an impact knocked a chunk off an icy nitrogen-covered planet 500m years ago and sent the piece tumbling out of its own star system, towards ours. The reddish remnant is believed to be a sliver of its original self, its outer layers evaporated by cosmic radiation and, more recently, the sun.
Advertisement
It is named Oumuamua, Hawaiian for scout, in honour of the observatory in Hawaii that discovered it in 2017.
Not all scientists accept the new explanation. Harvard University’s Avi Loeb disputes the findings and stands by his premise that the object appears to be more artificial than natural – in other words, something from an alien civilisation, perhaps a light sail. His recent book Extraterrestrial: The First Sign of Intelligent Life Beyond Earth, addresses the subject.
Given that Oumuamua is unlike comets and asteroids – and something not seen before – “we cannot assume business as usual, as many scientists argue”, Loeb wrote in an email Wednesday. “If we contemplate something that we had not seen before, we must leave the artificial origin hypothesis on the table and collect more evidence on objects from the same class.”
The Next Full Moon is the Pink Moon, the Sprouting Grass Moon, the Egg Moon, the Fish Moon, the Paschal Moon (for Eastern Christianity), Hanuman Jayanti, Bak Poya, and a Supermoon.
The next full Moon will be late Monday night, April 26, 2021, appearing opposite the Sun in Earth-based longitude at 11:32 p.m. EDT. This will be the next day from the Atlantic Daylight Savings timezone eastward across Africa, Europe, Asia, and Australia to the International Date Line. Most commercial calendars are based on Greenwich Mean Time (GMT) or Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) and will show this full Moon occurring on Tuesday, April 27, 2021. The Moon will appear full for about three days around this time, from Sunday night through Wednesday morning.
We had nice, clear skies last night. It was a beautiful moon.
Re: Planets, Comets, Asteroids, etc.
Posted: Tue Apr 27, 2021 10:46 am
by p0rtia
AndyinPA wrote: ↑Tue Apr 27, 2021 10:36 am
We had nice, clear skies last night. It was a beautiful moon.
I went out for my walk around 6 AM and boom! Giant full moon staring at me above the palms in a dark blue sky. Like having a friend to go for a walk with.
moon in the morning.jpg (117.42 KiB) Viewed 7996 times
CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) — With rubble from an asteroid tucked inside, a NASA spacecraft fired its engines and began the long journey back to Earth on Monday, leaving the ancient space rock in its rearview mirror.
The trip home for the robotic prospector, Osiris-Rex, will take two years.
Osiris-Rex reached asteroid Bennu in 2018 and spent two years flying near and around it, before collecting rubble from the surface last fall.
The University of Arizona’s Dante Lauretta, the principal scientist, estimates the spacecraft holds between a half pound and 1 pound (200 grams and 400 grams) of mostly bite-size chunks. Either way, it easily exceeds the target of at least 2 ounces (60 grams).
It will be the biggest cosmic haul for the U.S. since the Apollo moon rocks. While NASA has returned comet dust and solar wind samples, this is the first time it’s gone after pieces of an asteroid. Japan has accomplished it twice, but in tiny amounts.
Jupiter Looks Serene in Ultraviolet and Absolutely Terrifying in Infrared
Though named for the Roman riff on Zeus, the planet Jupiter looks every bit a happy home for Hades in an infrared image (below) captured by the Gemini North telescope of Mauna Kea’s Gemini Observatory. Meanwhile, the Hubble Space Telescope produced a lovely ultraviolet view of the planet. These contrasting images are a reminder that the visible spectrum tells only part of the story when it comes to objects in outer space.
Taken in January 2017, the three images capture Jupiter in three different lights: infrared, visible, and ultraviolet. They highlight atmospheric details of the largest planet in our solar system, offering insights into the formation of lightning storms there and revealing gaps through which researchers can peer deeper into the planet’s gassy recesses. Pockmarks are visible in the planet’s iconic Great Red Spot and remain a bit of a mystery—perhaps they’re gaseous eddies, as described in a recent NOIRLab post.
d0856a137574449de7356d9650e08ab1.jpg (40.32 KiB) Viewed 7544 times
Re: Planets, Comets, Asteroids, etc.
Posted: Thu May 13, 2021 10:53 am
by AndyinPA
Cool!
Re: Planets, Comets, Asteroids, etc.
Posted: Thu May 13, 2021 3:31 pm
by Tiredretiredlawyer
I liken Jupiter's looks to fashion moods - hot and sexy, work wear, and Sunday go to meeting.
Re: Planets, Comets, Asteroids, etc.
Posted: Fri May 14, 2021 12:41 am
by Estiveo
There was a loud BOOM!! a few hours ago that rattled the windows & startled me and the cat. No earthquake reported, but "what was that boom?" started appearing on social media from all over the central coast, San Jose to Monterey.
