MIAMI, Florida.- The largest asteroid of the year, half the size of Mount Everest, is ready to pass close to Earth in April.
More than four kilometers wide, Asteroid 527 (1998 OR2) has been classified as a “potentially dangerous object” by the Center for Near Earth Object Studies (CNEOS), the Business Insider portal cites.
It is slated to pass close to Earth on April 29 at 09:56 GMT, at which point it will be 3.9 million miles (6.2 million km) from our planet.
While that may sound distant, NASA classifies it as “close.”
If you have a telescope, you could see the asteroid that will pass near our planet.
How close it will be will help NASA monitor asteroid 527 (1998 OR2), this means it will help prepare for future encounters with other things in space.
To date, the agency has identified more than 20,000 near-Earth objects, asteroids or comets that can, during their orbits around the Sun, reach 30 million miles (48 million km) from Earth.
Of these, only a handful can be considered to potentially impact Earth, which NASA lists and tracks through its automated Sentry system, Ashley Strickland reports for CNN.
With information from Business Insider and CNN.
This note includes information on:
Business Insider and CNN.
–
– .
