
The asteroid will miss us by just 39,000 miles, or a fraction of the distance between us and the moon.
A huge asteroid is headed in Earth’s direction, although fortunately it will miss us when it passes by on Saturday evening. The space rock is between 50 and 120 feet in width, and will miss us by about 39,000 miles, or just a fifth of the distance between us and the moon.
The asteroid, dubbed 2018 CB, was discovered just last Sunday by a scientists operating a series of telescopes in Arizona. It is a pretty rare situation, as asteroids of this size do not often get this close to our planet, experts say.
It is even bigger than the asteroid that shocked Chelyabinsk, Russia, almost exactly five years ago. That asteroid was 20 meters wide and caused a massive shockwave that caused extensive damage throughout the city, injuring nearly 1,000 people.
“Two small asteroids recently discovered by astronomers at the NASA-funded Catalina Sky Survey (CSS) near Tucson, Arizona, are safely passing by Earth within one lunar distance this week,” reads the statement from NASA. “The first of this week’s close-approaching asteroids — discovered by CSS on Feb. 4 — is designated asteroid 2018 CC. Its close approach to Earth came Tuesday (Feb. 6) at 12:10 p.m. PST (3:10 p.m. EST) at a distance of about 114,000 miles (184,000 kilometers). The asteroid is estimated to be between 50 and 100 feet (15 and 30 meters) in size. Of potentially greater interest is asteroid 2018 CB,which will also pass closely by Earth on Friday, Feb. 9, at around 2:30 p.m. PST (5:30 p.m. EST), at a distance of about 39,000 miles (64,000 kilometers), which is less than one-fifth the distance of Earth to the Moon). The asteroid, which is estimated to be between 50 and 130 feet (15 and 40 meters) in size, was also discovered by CSS on Feb. 4.”
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