Asteroids Galore!

Another asteroid just made a close approach! Asteroid 2014 DX110 was closest to the Earth at 4pm EST.

How close?   According to the officials at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California, the asteroids closest approach was about 217,000 miles, which is about 350,000 km. Remember, the average distance from the Earth to the moon is 239,000 miles. That means this asteroid just passed between the Earth and the moon!

Now, for us here in Denver, or even those on the East Coast, the sun is still up. You couldn't see anything. Even for those people on the other side of the globe, you still couldn't see anything without a large telescope. This asteroid only has a diameter of 100 meters and thus is very, very faint. Even with some larger telescopes, this asteroid was moving so quickly, it was still hard to track.

The image on the right shows the asteroid that just made its close approach in relation to the background stars. 2014 DX110 is highlighted in a box and blown up so you can see what the object looks like. Mostly, it just looks like just another background star, except for the streak, which was caused because this asteroid is moving so quickly.

The image to the left shows the path the asteroid took as it made its close approach. The path that is depicted is how far the asteroid traveled in only 2 hours! Because this asteroid moves so quickly, it makes it very difficult to track. 

Why might you not have heard about this object? Most likely because it was only discovered last Friday, announced by the Minor Planet Center on Sunday, it is faint, and it won’t be impacting Earth. Although, Slooh hosted a live event detailing this asteroid as it made its close approach. You can watch it here and catch up on all the details.

During the show, the host mentioned that there is going to be another asteroid the will pass extremely close to us within the next couple of days. This object is 2014 CU13, an asteroid of about 20-46 feet in diameter. This asteroid will pass within 37,000 miles of Earth!! Slooh will be hosting another live show on Sunday to track this asteroid.