An asteroid of at least more than 500 feet will pass close to Earth this Friday, and it will not be the only one.
Seven others, even larger, will approach our planet in November
, according to the Center for Near-Earth Object Studies of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA, for its acronym in English).
The asteroid, dubbed
2021 SM3
, was discovered a week ago
and NASA classified it as a near-Earth object (NEO).
NEOs are comets and asteroids "that have been pushed by the gravitational pull of nearby planets into orbits that allow them to enter close to Earth," according to NASA.
This Hispanic designer dresses superheroes and their outfits have reached space
Oct. 8, 202102: 59
At its closest,
2021 SM3
will be about three million miles from Earth
, according to USA Today, which compared its size to the Great Pyramid of Giza in Egypt, one of the seven wonders of the ancient world.
Of the asteroids recorded in the vicinity, the
1996 VB3
, 850 feet and due to pass on October 20, is the closest to our planet: 2.1 million miles away.
The largest will be the
2004
1,246-foot
EU
, like New York's Empire State Building skyscraper, which on November 13 will pass 2.2 million miles from Earth.
[A meteorite passes through the roof of a house and falls on the bed of a sleeping woman, brushing her head on the pillow]
The British astronomer Alan Fitzsimmon considers that it is only a matter of time before the planet suffers a "serious" collision of a space rock: "It may not in the course of our lives, but mother nature controls when it will happen," he told the network. BBC.
The European Space Agency (ESA) will launch in 2024 a spacecraft, baptized as
Hera
(the name of the queen of the Greek gods, wife of Zeus) to test whether hitting an asteroid
at high speed
can divert it from the path.
NASA has a similar mission: to crash at 4 miles per second into an asteroid 525 feet in diameter to prove that its orbit can be varied.
Your spacecraft expects to make contact with the space rock in October 2022.
These experiments will make it possible to study the feasibility of the method, but the asteroids chosen do not pose a danger to Earth.
The problem is that, for now, it is not known which one it may be.
That is why Fitzsimmons
asked
all amateur astronomers
for help
to keep an eye on the sky;
After all, many of the rocks that could pose a threat have been discovered this way.
NASA aims to control up to 90% of asteroids over a mile and a half in diameter, and this rock was much smaller, making it less destructive (not as large as the one that triggered
the extinction of the dinosaurs
) but also less easy to spot.
Of the asteroids recorded by NASA, 1996 VB3, which will pass on October 20, is the closest to our planet.Science Photo Library - ANDRZEJ / Getty Images
If it had collided with our planet, it would have been like a nuclear explosion of about
10 megatons
, that is, hundreds of times more powerful than the bomb that destroyed the Japanese city of Hiroshima during World War II.
"I wish I could tell you that these events are exceptional, unique, but they are not", explained the head of NASA, Jim Bridenstine, "these events are not rare."
According to NASA, they occur
once every 60 years
, but only in the last century were three major impacts against the Earth.
In 2013, a 55-foot-diameter rock fell in Russia.
It crashed with "30 times more energy than
the Hiroshima atomic bomb,"
injuring 1,500 people.
Hours later, an even larger one was detected that passed nearby but did not impact the planet.
"
This is not Hollywood
, this has nothing to do with a movie," NASA warned, these rocks "are big enough to destroy a US state."
or "an entire European country".
In any case, the odds are not relatively high.
Thus, for example, there is only
1 in 11,000
that a 1,100-foot-diameter meteor that is estimated to pass 260,000 miles from Earth on October 3 will end up colliding with our planet.
In comparison,
the probability of winning the
Powerball
lottery
is 1 in 292 million, and the Mega Millions is 1 in 303 million.
The chance of being struck by lightning in your lifetime is 1 in 15,000.
The chance of dying from a poisonous plant or animal is 1 in 45,000.
The chance of dating a supermodel is 1 in 88,000; the chance of dying in a plane crash is 1 in 188,000.
And the chance of being attacked by a shark is 1 in 3.7 million.