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The ship to hit the asteroid is ready. NASA already has a launch date
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Fortunately, humans don’t have to worry, the asteroid will really just fly around the Earth. The closest to the planet is about 5.8 million kilometers. “At first glance, this may sound like a fairly safe distance, but it’s actually quite close – much, much closer than, for example, Venus, Earth’s neighbor,” writes USA Today.
Asteroid 2021 SM3 belongs to the objects in English called Near-Earth Objects (freely can be translated as near-Earth bodies). The orbits of these objects are located to Earth at a distance of less than 190 million kilometers. NASA is closely monitoring them and as already The diary informed, in November this year, he wants to send a spaceship into space, on which he intends to test deflection technology. It aims to create deviations in the courses of moving bodies. And so it could affect the movement of near-Earth objects, which, as has been shown in history, do not always avoid the Earth.
Like a flying skyscraper
Friday’s flight of the asteroid 2021 SM3 will not be the only one that awaits us in the coming weeks. “By the end of November, seven more asteroids, larger than 2021 SM3, will fly near Earth. The asteroid 1996 VB3 will get closest to the planet on October 20. It measures almost 230 meters and reaches 3.4 million kilometers on Earth, “warns the USA Today website, which refers to data from NASA.
The largest asteroid to approach Earth this fall is about the same as New York’s famous Empire State Building – about 380 meters. “It’s called 2004 UE, and it will be closest to Earth on November 13th. Specifically, at a distance of about 4.2 million kilometers, “describes the website USA Today.