Illustration: © Getty Images / Science Photo Library - ANDRZEJ WOJCICKI
A freshly detected asteroid has been put straight onto the ecu Space Agency’s ‘risk list’ as calculations forecast that it could smash into Earth in 10 years.
The agency detected the space rock in the week and immediately added it to the list of probably hazardous near-Earth objects, as calculations predict that it's going to hit our planet on August 31, 2029.
The data indicates that the thing , referred to as 2020 PG6, are going to be traveling at a mean speed of over 46,000kph because it races towards Earth. Thankfully, if the asteroid does stray into Earth’s path, it’s unlikely to cause a big amount of injury because it only measures about 14 meters in diameter.
However, the thing may be a similar size to the Chelyabinsk meteor which exploded above Russia in February 2013. The comet was just 18 meters in diameter, but was still sizable enough to cause significant localized damage to thousands of buildings within the area.
An asteroid just made the closest fly-by of Earth ever recorded… and no-one saw it coming
Scientific investigations into the dramatic explosion found that the energy released by the blast was like about 30 atomic bombs.
The space agency says that the chances of 2020 PG6 hitting Earth in 2029 are one out of 416, making it one among the asteroids with the very best chances of colliding with Earth on the danger list.
Astronomers will learn more about the newly detected asteroid when it travels past our planet on September 2. During the upcoming flyby, the space rock will come no closer than around 1.4 million miles from Earth so there’s no reason for alarm.
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