Thread by @BiIndia

The biggest #asteroid of 2021 is going to zoom past Earth tonight flying as fast as 100,000 kmph - By @pabsgill

businessinsider.in/science/space/…

The biggest asteroid of the year is set to fly past Earth tonight. The space rock, dubbed 2001 FO32, is nearly half a kilometre wide — that’s more than twice the height of India’s Statue of Unity, the tallest statue in the world.

Moreover, it will be closing in on the planet at a whopping speed of 123,876 kilometres per hour (kmph), which is faster than an average asteroid.

According to the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), the asteroid doesn’t pose any threat to our planet.

The #CNEOS has been tracking this asteroid for nearly two decades since it was first spotted on 23 March 2001 by the Lincoln Near-Earth Asteroid Research (LINEAR) program.

Initially, it was thought to be one kilometre wide, which is 200 metres wider than even the height of the world’s tallest building Burj Khalifa.

However, more recent observations were able to determine that the asteroid is more like between 440 metres to 680 metres wide.

The encounter set to take place on March 21 will provide astronomers with the opportunity to get a more precise reading on the space rock not only in terms of its size but also to determine its composition.

It helps that the asteroid is going to be ten times closer than it was in 2001 at a distance of 23.9 kilometres from Earth.

What’s the real threat?

The bigger the asteroid, the bigger the threat. As long it doesn’t get close enough to be pulled in by Earth’s gravity, Earthlings can breathe a sigh of relief.

In 2013, the Chelyabinsk meteor — only 17 metres wide — streaked through the skies of Russia and exploded only 30 kilometres above the Earth’s surface.